Lost Cause
by detective-wiseass
Summary: Some wounds seem to deep to heal. Pain threatens at every turn to drive the detective and the medical examiner apart. But no cause is truly lost until the last person has given up hope. Will Jane and Maura see their way to mend their bond through shared struggle, or will they give up the ghost of a dead friendship?
1. Chapter 1

She was fidgeting again as they both stood over the autopsy table.

Maura sighed quietly. They'd had so many difficult heart-to-heart discussions in the morgue, what was one more? "Jane, it has been pretty clear since this morning that you have something on your mind you want to tell me." She punctuated the statement with direct eye contact and raised eyebrows.

"'So spill,' is what you're saying," Jane replied.

Maura nodded. "Yes, that is what I'm saying." She put the scalpel down and pointed to Jane's hands. She was twisting and wringing them, pressing and rubbing the scars. "They only bother you this much when it's cold or when you're really nervous about something."

Chagrinned, Jane abruptly dropped her hands and averted her gaze. Maura knew her so damn well. Too damn well.

In the silence while Jane gathered her thoughts, Maura picked up her scalpel and resumed her incision. Occasionally, she would raise her eyes to check if Jane was ready to speak.

Jane finally lifted her head and smiled sheepishly. "I…I talked to Casey last night."

"And?" Maura didn't look up this time.

_Odd_, Jane thought. But she plunged ahead anyway. "And I gave him my answer." She waited, needing some reaction, any reaction. Maura had yet to look at her once she mentioned Casey, and it was throwing Jane off.

The medical examiner finished her incision, laid the scalpel on the table, and raised her head. "What did you say?" She loathed the hopeful flutter in her stomach, hated the way her pulse accelerated as she anticipated the improbable possibility.

"I said…yes."

And there it was. The inevitable truth. Maura had been striving to come to terms with the likelihood that her best friend – and, coincidentally, the love of her life – would soon cleave herself to a man who frankly didn't deserve her. What was more, he didn't know her. Not like Maura knew her. He hadn't spent the time to really learn about her, to understand who she is in her entirety. _What he knows is his sexual attraction to her and a superficial admiration of her as an individual. _Not that he could entirely be faulted for not taking the time to really get to know Jane. The Army so often called him away overseas, the kind of day-in, day-out intimacy that needed to happen for a long-term, monogamous relationship to be successful was physically impossible for Casey. Maura did not entirely blame him for this. What she could not overlook, however, was his manner of proposing by way of ultimatum. It didn't take a medical degree to see that this was not the preface to a healthy, lasting relationship.

Her stomach clenched.

"Maura?" Jane was staring at her, curiosity and concern drawing her brows together. "What are you thinking right now?"

Her skin felt cold. "You're getting married."

Jane gave a nervous smile. "Yes, Maura. I'm getting married to Casey. Are you okay?"

"Yes!" Maura forced a bright smile that was painfully obvious, no doubt, and pulled off her gloves. "I'm fine!" She even brought herself to touch Jane's arm on her way out and said, "Congratulations, Jane. I'll…I'll be right back." And she whisked toward the double doors. She hoped Jane hadn't felt her fingers trembling as she made her escape.

_You are Doctor Maura Isles, ME, _Maura told herself as she hurried to the restroom. _Calm, composed. Unflappable. Queen of the Dead. _She burst into the nearest stall, locked herself in, and sagged against the wall.

In her wake, Jane was left standing at the autopsy table alone, a crease of confusion deepening between her brows and a disappointed slump to her shoulders.


	2. Chapter 2

The next day, any feeble hopes that reduced the marriage conversation to a mere nightmare died. Jane came to work with an engagement ring on her finger. It was not in her nature to flaunt it; indeed, she seemed to go to great lengths to avoid mentioning it to anyone, but Maura noticed.

Since their earliest acquaintance, Jane's hands held a fascination for Maura, so much so that she habitually observed the most subtle and delicate of their movements. Slender and graceful, it did not matter that Jane never wore jewelry out of practicality. Such splendid bone structure required no adornment. But now that a simple engagement band graced Jane's left hand, it was all Maura could do to keep her eyes from it. She could not – figuratively speaking – wrap her mind around the fact that Casey's hands and not hers had put that ring on Jane's finger.

Jane tried not to notice the direction of Maura's gaze, but the two of them had long been so attuned to each other, she noticed almost every time. After work that evening, she gently confronted Maura about it over wine. She thought it might help clear the elephant from the room if they simply addressed this strange, puzzling, newfound awkwardness for what it was. It didn't take long for the opportunity to present itself.

As Jane lifted her glass to her lips, Maura's eyes fixated on the ring. Jane's dark gaze hung on Maura's face for a moment before reaching over to set the glass aside, breaking her friend's troubling trance. "Weird, isn't it?" she said, dropping both hands into her lap and slowly, absently rotating the band on her dominant ring finger. "Plenty of guys in the bullpen today said they never thought they'd see me wear one of these." She gave a dry chuckle, trying her best to open the topic for peaceful discussion.

Maura hesitated. "It is…different." She sighed. _I may never get accustomed to it. _"And given how much time and energy you've spent over the years cultivating the reputation that you have now…"

"What part of my reputation do you mean?" Jane fought to keep the frown from her face, but her head still tilted slightly to the side, uncertain. She reached for her wine glass again, eyes never leaving Maura.

Maura gestured noncommittally. "Just that…well, you are a strong, independent, and established professional." Jane raised her glass slightly in acknowledgement of this. A faint smile graced her lips. "You are a woman with a clearly defined career as her priority. Everyone understands this to be the…template, if you will, for who Jane Rizzoli is. Given this general understanding, it would make sense that some of your colleagues might find it…" she trailed off, searching for an appropriate adjective.

"Disconcerting?" Jane provided.

"Unexpected."

Jane considered this a moment, forehead creasing. Maura quashed the urge to reach over and smooth the furrows with her fingertips. Evidently reaching a verdict after a brief mental deliberation, Jane shrugged and lifted one eyebrow. "Fair enough. I guess that makes sense when you phrase it like that."

Maura managed a small smile, gratified that she could make herself understood.

"I guess…more to the point, I was wondering what _you _think. How _you _feel, Maura. That's more important to me than any of the guys."

Maura had to take a moment to collect herself. Jane didn't know how she affected the medical examiner. How could she? She didn't grasp the impact her words had in conversations like this. The thought that Jane would say, so simply and frankly, that Maura's thoughts and feelings toward the situation were of such value to her nearly brought her to tears. _Just tell her._ Maura thought._ Just get it out. You will at least be relieved of the burden and feel better for it._ And she almost did. She felt the words trade places with the wine on her tongue.

_I love you, Jane. I'm in love with you and I think you're making a huge mistake. _

But Jane's eyes on hers made her hesitate and rethink the impulse. Dark, warm, questioning eyes that sought reassurance, searched her face for it. Maura remembered then that this was as new – if not more so – for Jane as it was for Maura. The last thing her best friend needed now was an emotional wrench thrown in the works, and by the one person she trusted to keep her grounded through all this.

"I'm," she scanned her vocabulary once again for just the right adjective, "pleased. I'm pleased, Jane. That is, I'm happy if you are happy." Jane's expression remained doubtful. Maura hoped desperately that her physiology wouldn't betray the lie just this once. Seeing the uncertainty hadn't completely melted away from Jane's expression, Maura took her hand – her right hand, in an unconscious effort to avoid direct contact with the unsavory truth – and brushed her thumb across the back of it. The caress lingered each time it passed over the old, familiar scar. Whether she was conscious of it or not, Maura always paid special attention to Jane's scars whenever their hands happened to meet in a gesture of mutual affection. It was her way of conveying, beyond words, the equal value she placed on all aspects of Jane's being. _Casey will never understand her. Not completely. Not enough. _"You know all I want for you is to be happy."

She hoped these last few truths would be enough to counterbalance all the lying it seemed she'd been doing lately. No wonder Jane had begun to notice how "off" she was. Dishonesty, however slight, always took its toll.

Now Jane looked close to tears. She smiled and nodded. Neither of them had a word that quite encompassed this particular emotion of being moved to something that transcended the most profound happiness. But they felt it in moments like this, sharing their love and appreciation for one another. "I know." Jane ducked her head, then, suddenly shy. "And that means the world to me," she concluded, voice barely above a whisper.

And again, Maura found she had to look away for a moment and remember to breathe. Her heart constricted, and though she didn't realize it, she tightened her grip ever so slightly on Jane's hand. Jane felt it and couldn't help wondering what was truly bothering Maura. Sensing she'd asked enough questions of the doctor for the night, Jane just returned the squeeze on instinct, as holding Maura's hand seemed the most natural and sufficient thing she could be doing in that moment.

And all Maura could think was, _I'm so afraid to let go._


	3. Chapter 3

Wedding plans and preparation came hard and fast. Casey felt he had waited long enough for this time in their lives, and felt no reason to postpone their union any longer. Jane was a perpetual bundle of nerves, and stressed in a way that Maura had never seen before in the detective.

"Maura, I need you."

The medical examiner's eyes darted up from her computer with wide hazel eyes, brows arched.

"I need your help." Jane had dark circles under her eyes again. Her raven hair framed her face with wild tangles, its dark shade contrasting with her unusually pale face. Maura wondered if all this new stress was causing her detective's subconscious to revisit old nightmares.

_Not _my _detective, _she admonished herself. _She was never mine, nor will she ever be now._ Quelling the heaviness that had settled in her abdomen, Maura wheeled her computer chair away from her desk. "Anything, Jane. What's this about, what can I do?" She took a couple of steps toward Jane, looking her in the eye, hoping to ground her. She only briefly allowed herself to entertain the idea of having Jane stay the night so that she could sleep.

Jane looked like she didn't even know where to start. She drew herself up a little, straightening regal shoulders and lifting her chin ever so slightly. She held that posture for a second or two, clearly ordering her words before opening her mouth – a process she wasn't in the habit of engaging in. Abruptly, she relinquished any semblance of calm and cut to the chase. "I need – that is, I would _like _very much if you would…" she let out a breath, struggling.

Struggling with what, Maura couldn't even begin to speculate.

"If I would…what, Jane? I'll do anything you ask." _Oh dear, that sounded desperate._ "I want to help."

Jane continued to hesitate, drawing a breath and then faltering and letting it out. Maura was at a loss as to what Jane was grappling with that made it so difficult to ask. When Jane began twisting the engagement ring on her finger, Maura nearly seized her hand to make her stop fidgeting. It was making her nervous.

"Jane, whatever it is, I am your best friend and it couldn't possibly be above or beneath my ability or willingness to help you. Just tell me." Her brows drew together in concern, and she resisted the compulsion to take Jane's hand in both of her own. She looked closer, wondering again what it was that Jane found so hard to give voice to. "What can I do?" she whispered.

Jane took a minute step back from the medical examiner but maintained eye contact. Another moment passed, and she finally opened her mouth. Her voice cracked endearingly when she spoke, and Maura again felt an impulse to touch her, reassure her. "Maura, would you be the…maid of honor?" Then she huffed almost imperceptibly and corrected herself. "_My _maid of honor?"

Synapses fired in rapid succession and an intensely tangled knot of thoughts and emotions tumbled about and bumped every wall within Maura's psyche. Of course Jane would ask her to be the maid of honor in her wedding. She needed help with all the planning, and…_I am her best friend. Who else would she ask? _Then, a moment later, _But why was that so hard for her to say? _Maura tilted her head quizzically to one side, an involuntary quirk of movement that prompted Jane to elaborate.

"It's just," Jane ran her fingers through the tangled mess of her hair, "Ma's been driving me nuts trying to get stuff planned and prepared." Jane held up a hand to qualify. "And she's been a world of help, don't get me wrong, but she – I'm going crazy with her constant – "

Then Maura couldn't resist reaching for Jane's wrist, slowing the tide of words. "She only wants to help, Jane. She's your mother and she loves you." Maura nearly gasped when she realized how cold Jane's hands were. Her circulation patterns had undoubtedly altered in her body's efforts to cope with exhaustion.

The detective nodded. "I know. But she gets – she's been driving me up the wall for the past forty-eight hours. More so than usual." Her eyes flew wide in exasperation and flitted about the room. "When we fought last night –"

"You fought with Angela?" Maura was aghast. Jane and her mother frequently had disagreements, but they rarely dissolved into intense confrontation.

Jane's speech pattern accelerated as she explained herself. "Yeah, we actually got into a fight about it, Maura." She grew quiet for a moment, and added almost as an aside, "I said some things –" then she regained momentum, "but I apologized for them later. "Which is why I'm asking you now; she brought it up, demanding to know why in the hell I hadn't asked you yet because if I don't want to deal with her, then the next best person to help with wedding plans is my best friend – the maid of honor always helps the bride plan and stuff." She slumped with a heavy sigh, exhausted from getting riled up all over again.

The unflappable Chief ME was reeling inside. She couldn't determine whether, given the circumstances, standing next to Jane at the altar was the best or the worst alternative to standing face-to-face with her, exchanging rings and vows.

And with the woman she loved more than anything standing in front of her now, exasperation on her pale face and an anxious question in her eyes, Doctor Maura Isles flat had no idea what to say.


	4. Chapter 4

"Maura, you really are a lifesaver."

The medical examiner managed a quasi-convincing smile at Angela Rizzoli's breathless remark. So much needed to be done. She already had Frankie and Tommy busy schlepping wedding decorations while she bustled around town – and, incidentally, around Jane's condo - making last-minute arrangements.

It had been two months since Jane had initially approached Maura with her maid-of-honor request. Maura had taken a day to think, and that 24-hour period had been one of the most gut-wrenching of Jane's life. In the moments before Maura came to give her an answer, Jane had been on the brink of calling everything off, thinking there was no way she could make it through this process without Maura at her side.

But while the detective had been immensely relieved that her best friend was still there for her, the strangeness that had materialized between them never dissipated. Jane didn't understand it, nor did she question it. She hardly had the headspace to spare for puzzling out the shifting dynamic of her relationship with Maura. She put up with this new, disconcerting element because she felt it was all she could do.

The detective rounded the corner from her bedroom into the kitchen and gave a subtle start at the sight of her main living area. Every available surface area was overrun with billowing miscellany in white and deep rose – her chosen wedding colors. She met Maura's eyes with an expression that said very clearly, "I have yet to grow accustomed to all this…_froth _taking over my condo." Maura couldn't help her half-hearted smile growing larger and more sincere at the sight of Jane. Maura remained frustrated that Jane was marrying a man that Maura knew caused her more stress than joy, but her love for, and loyalty to the detective trumped any resentment.

Jane returned the smile, eyes crinkling at the corners and dimples deepening. She reached for Maura's arm and gave it a grateful squeeze. With a meaningful glance in her mother's direction, she murmured, "Thanks for coming."

Maura nodded. Briefly laying her fingers over Jane's, wishing she could capture and keep them there for as long as she wanted. "Of course, Jane." She was the best friend and maid of honor, it was both her duty and her pleasure to help in any way she could. Just so long as she didn't dwell overmuch on the fact that these preparations were for Jane's union with Casey. She looked to Angela. "What can I do?"

"Actually, Maura, we need an extra pair of eyes for the final fitting," Angela said. "Your eyes, specifically. Our appointment is in a half hour, and with traffic we'll probably need that long to get there."

Maura's eyes snapped to Jane's as if drawn by magnets. Jane froze where she stood, held Maura's gaze as though incapable of looking away. They both felt the tremendous portents of this moment, but neither of them could pinpoint why it weighed so heavily on them both.

Maura drew an expectant breath, anticipating the typical Jane Rizzoli sarcastic addendum to her mother's logistical nattering.

But the acerbic Rizzoli wit was not forthcoming. Instead, Jane could only offer the identical twin of the noncommittal shrug and quirk of the brow that she gave the day she recounted Casey's ultimatum.

Maura's stomach dropped. She felt suddenly lighter than air, as if everything of substance that kept her solid had been sucked from her body. And she felt unbearably heavy with the need to seize Jane's face with both hands and kiss the breath out of her. In her mind, she did just that.

In body, she dutifully waited for Jane to open the door for her so she could pass through.

The detective had made her choice. And now a dress needed its final fitting.


	5. Chapter 5

_Maura lengthened her stride slightly to keep pace with Jane. "Are you sure you want to go this far today?"_

_They rounded a corner and jogged into the park. Maura realized that she paid significantly less attention to her surroundings when Jane was at her side. But there was something about the subtle change in the gritty sound of sneaker soles impacting asphalt that never failed to alert Maura to the change of scenery._

_Jane huffed in between steady breaths. "My ankle's fine now, Maura. It'll hold." The untrained ear would fail to catch the note of tender amusement beneath the irritation and bravado. But Maura had years of practice in the art of discerning Jane's many nuanced vocal inflections. One glance to her left won her a flicker of that gentle, indulgent smile that she'd come to depend on. Maura postulated that she'd come as close as she ever would to confirming her long-standing suspicion: Jane secretly cherished Maura's endless litany of concerns for the detective's health and safety._

_Jane snuck a peek at Maura, amused smile morphing into a devious grin. _

_Wary of what mischief her friend might be concocting, Maura's eyebrows drew together even as she cautiously returned that winsome smile. _

_The rhythm of Jane's stride shifted slightly. "I'm on to you, Doctor."_

"_What could you possibly have to suspect me of, Jane?"_

_Jane turned her gaze to the fork in the trail ahead of them. "You're not worried about my ankle at all." _

_Before Maura could be affronted and argue to the contrary, Jane had launched into a hearty sprint down the lane that led into the trees, ponytail bouncing. She shouted over her shoulder, "You're just afraid if I decided to _really _run, you wouldn't be able to keep up!" _

"_Jane!" Maura mock-whined. "That's not fair!" She chased after Jane, feeling the endorphins begin to flow as she entered the shade of the tree-lined path. She was fully grinning by the time she caught up with Jane._

_They maintained their brisk pace for several more strides before Jane made an executive decision and pulled back. The decrease in speed happened more suddenly than Maura anticipated, and she overshot Jane by a few steps before she got her momentum in check. When she turned around, Jane was leaning over, appearing to reach for her recently healed ankle. _

"_You shouldn't have gone so far, or so fast," Maura admonished softly as she approached. _

_Jane immediately straightened. Hands moved to slender hips and her brows narrowed at the medical examiner. "Maura, I told you, it's fine."_

_Maura tried not to stare too obviously at Jane's posture – her left knee bent slightly to compensate for weakness in the ankle. "And I was – am – inclined to disregard your claims of a sound talofibular ligament." Maura mirrored the detective's defensive stance, arms akimbo. "And judging by the unequal distribution of weight in your current posture, I think it's fair to say I'm –" _

"_It's _my_ ankle, Maura! I think I'd know!" Jane's voice was pitched with rising frustration._

"_I agree," Maura said, disarming the detective with her concurrence and earnest eye contact. "I think you do know, and if you actually heeded the subtle pain signals your ankle has been sending your brain since we started this run, you would not have taken off like you did just then. Nor would you have pushed yourself to cover the distance that we've already come. I would've been much more comfortable with you stopping closer to halfway through our route. But you decided to be obstinate, and –"_

_Jane flapped her hand in exasperation. "Okay, okay, Maura. I get it!" She conceded further by acknowledging the pain in her ankle, doubling over to gingerly massage it. After a moment, she shot an irate glare up at the medical examiner. "If you would've been happy stopping halfway through, why didn't you pipe up?"_

"_Would you have listened?" Maura cocked a skeptical brow at her._

"_Yes!" Maura's eyebrow rose even higher. "No," Jane amended, hanging her head. "Point taken," she mumbled._

_Satisfied, Maura let her off the hook. She leaned down and touched Jane's elbow. "Can you walk back?"_

_An exasperated sigh came in response. "Yes, I can walk." At least this time Jane refrained from insisting she was "fine."_

_Maura's hand traveled to her upper arm and stayed there as they turned around and began to retrace their route. After a few minutes, Jane folded her arms and rested her hand on top of Maura's. The medical examiner suppressed a smile. "I still don't fully grasp why you do this to yourself." _

_Jane frowned quizzically, but rather than question, she let Maura elaborate in her own time._

"_Why you push into things when you're not ready. When you clearly know the circumstances obviously aren't right for the choice you're making. Sometimes I think I understand – at least in part. But other times…Jane, you're still so…"_

_Picking up where she trailed off, Jane concluded ruefully, "Deceptively complex?"_

_Laughter sprung naturally from Maura's throat as Jane finished the sentence for her, quoting the medical examiner's own words, from years ago, back to her._

Standing in the wings of the chapel, bouquet in hand, Maura very deliberately shook herself from her reverie. The seemingly terminal wait for the procession to begin had opened the door for her mind to wander through the archives of Jane-related memories. After all, they comprised her best and most extensive set of recollections.

Hearing the processional music begin, Maura couldn't help but note that particular memory was almost a year old now. Yet her puzzlement over Jane's modus operandi remained mostly the same. Yes, over the years Maura had accrued a vast catalogue of observational data in her personal case study of Jane Rizzoli. Many previously dubious character traits and behavioral tendencies had come to be explained as Maura learned more about the detective's past. She came to understand certain intricacies of the detective's personality even better than members of Jane's own family. A pattern of logic, unique to Jane, continued to reveal itself with time.

But always, certain pieces of the pattern would turn up missing. Much to Maura's dismay, the logic would fail, and the scientist in her was left at a loss. _ "Now for the hitch in Jane's character," _she thought, unexpectedly quoting Charlotte Bronte to herself. _"I still don't fully grasp why you do this to yourself. Why you push into things when you're not ready. When you clearly know the circumstances aren't right for the choice you're making." _She sighed, glancing down one last time at the lovely bouquet in her hands – red and white roses – and prepared to step out into the aisle and await her best friend at the altar. _I may have been referring to her decision-making process in the context of her physical recklessness, _Maura thought, reviewing the memory one last time, _but to all intents and purposes, I think she and I both knew, if only at a subconscious level, that there were much more complex and abstract relational issues on the table that day. _And all the signs pointed to Jane sliding down into that same trap she always laid for herself. Taking another impetuous plunge into what Maura's logic was forecasting as an ill-fated chapter of her life. And still Maura wondered, even as she stepped into the aisle, smiling for the congregation, _Why does she do this?_


	6. Chapter 6

Maura waited at the altar, watching the love of her life glide slowly on her father's arm, with a radiant smile, down the aisle towards her. She was clearly nervous, but still positively glowing in the sleeveless white gown. Maura smiled and took a moment to compliment herself on her choice of gown; Angela had been right to trust her judgment on style and fit. The cut of the dress perfectly and tastefully accentuated Jane's athletic, ectomorphic build. She flushed with pride, and for a moment, Jane seemed to respond in kind, joyful smile breaking into a beaming grin behind the sheer veil. Her hair was up, elegantly coifed and beaded with pearls. The medical examiner's eyes wandered from the bride's face, pausing a moment to appreciate how the up-do highlighted the regal curve of Jane's neck. Returning her gaze to Jane's face, Maura noticed the detective had broken eye contact.

Reality slammed into Maura, feeling like a kettlebell behind her abdominal muscles. Jane wasn't walking towards her from the end of the aisle. She had never been walking towards Maura. Her eyes had locked on the man standing not four feet from Maura. The man standing at the center of the raised dais that housed the altar, flanked by the priest, one of his comrades in full dress uniform, Frankie, and herself.

The man Jane had said "yes" to.

_Jane, what are you doing? _It was all Maura could do to keep from asking aloud as Jane handed her the bridal bouquet so she could take Casey's hands.

"Do you, Charles Anthony Jones…"

Maura could see from where she was standing behind Jane that her best friend was shaking with the adrenaline coursing through her veins. She shifted imperceptibly closer, longing so deeply to touch the woman before her. Witnessing Jane's body's natural reaction to all the stress – both good and bad – that had accumulated over the past few months, had a powerful, magnetic effect on the medical examiner. On an intuitive level, Maura experienced an intense need to comfort. Where she had always known herself to be perceived as relatively cold and aloof, Maura had come to understand that Jane coaxed a strong but unpracticed and deeply buried nurturing instinct to the surface of Maura's personality.

"I do." Casey's voice.

Another shiver, visible only to Maura – and perhaps to Casey – passed through Jane's body.

"Do you, Jane Clementine Rizzoli…"

Maura edged her hand closer to Jane, unable to stop herself. She took a brief assessment of the many vantage points within the congregation and judged that the move she was about to make would be noticed by no one save herself. And possibly Jane.

Maura's knuckles brushed feather light against the small of Jane's back. The touch lingered just enough for Maura to feel the nervous tension in Jane's lumbar region. Just barely enough to feel the muscle groups relax at her touch. She needed this. They both did.

"I…"

At the moment when the husky voice faltered, Maura found herself flush again with a heat born of desperation. She wanted to touch Jane again.

_Jane, it'll be okay. We'll be okay. Just a little longer. _Was she addressing her best friend or herself? Maura's emotions had never been so discombobulated before.

"…do."


	7. Chapter 7

_I love you Jane. So much. You're my best friend and I wish you every possible happiness in the world._

After hours of mentally rehearsing what she would say late at night when the reception wound down to its inevitable close, Maura decided that this phrasing was the most palatable. It allowed her to avoid lying without coming across as too contrived or insincere. She didn't have to actually say "congratulations" to Jane, which would be, in effect, a lie. She didn't feel in her heart of hearts that congratulations were in order.

It wasn't that Maura was bitter. She could never resent her best friend – truly the best person she had ever known and had the privilege of loving. But she couldn't bring herself, in all honesty, to congratulate Jane on a commitment that Maura felt would inevitably turn out wrong for her.

This way, this line, as she had practiced it ad infinitum in her mind, was the best she could do. This way came across as socially acceptable while still remaining faithful to the unique closeness and frankness that had always kept them together.

And this way, Maura was prepared. She knew what she would say, when she would say it, and even how she would confirm it with the appropriate physical gestures of affection and good will.

What she wasn't prepared for – what she had never been truly able to prepare for – was Jane.

Maura had just returned from fetching her jacket from the venue's coat closet, stepping back onto the outdoor dance floor to thank Angela for a wonderful evening. In her mind, she was also thanking the older woman for giving birth to and raising the most beautiful person Maura had ever known. Angela seemed to sense Maura's frustration with the inadequacy of words, for she enveloped the medical examiner in a long, warm, maternal hug. In that embrace, Maura imagined Angela was trying to convey some gratitude of her own.

Warming to the possibility of settling back into a permanent niche within the Rizzoli family dynamic, Maura found herself blindsided by Unexpected Variable Number One.

Jane approached her. Without Casey.

Maura had fully expected to step up to the newlyweds and gently part them for the briefest instant on the pretense of imparting well-wishes and saying goodnight to the bride. Her duties as maid-of-honor had been fulfilled as far as she could see, and there was no reason for her to stay any longer. But Jane – apparently still hyper-vigilant even at her own wedding – must have seen the beginnings of Maura's leave-taking and thought to head her off. Perhaps she was afraid Maura might try slipping away without saying goodbye, without being thanked for her generous assistance with the wedding plans and preparations.

If this was the case, Maura had to acknowledge that Jane's fears would not be entirely out of the realm of possibility. But she had planned to approach Jane first.

"Maura." Jane's voice husked softly from behind her. She turned, and Angela left them alone without another word. Maura peeked over Jane's shoulder, looking for Casey. "You're leaving?"

Maura met Jane's eyes. Unexpected Variable Number Two – those rich dark eyes were shining with unshed tears. Maura couldn't discern from Jane's expression whether the tears stemmed from a positive or negative emotion, or whether they were simply the relief of pent-up stress. _Or she's sad to see you go_, Maura mused for a moment, but swiftly quashed the idea before it developed into an unhealthy fantasy. "Things seemed to be winding down." She shrugged. "I thought I'd say my goodbyes and call it an evening." She offered a soft smile.

Jane nodded. "Could I…talk to you for a second? Before you go?"

"Of course, Jane."

They stood in an uncharacteristically awkward silence for a few seconds. Maura spent those seconds almost uncomfortably aware of Jane's splendid physique, displayed with such class in the rose colored evening gown she had changed into for the reception. Another of Maura's selections. The medical examiner finally deemed the pause had lasted long enough and it was appropriate to prompt Jane. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

Jane shifted her weight slightly, almost slipping into "posturing detective" mode before catching herself. Maura suppressed a smile at Jane's old habits refusing to quit. "Actually, I've had this sense for a while – basically all night – that _you've_ had something on _your _mind that you want to tell me."

And now came Unexpected Variable Number Three. Maura's stream of consciousness froze over and everything in her seemed to lock up. She had been depending on one of Jane's momentary lapses in her normally acute emotional intuitiveness. On her maddening lack of perception in certain matters of the human heart.

_Now is your chance. Take it, or regret it forever. _

Maura unconsciously shook her head, telling her ego she wasn't ready. Luckily, Jane appeared to interpret that as meaning, "No, there actually wasn't anything I needed to tell you right now," and let it slide. Instead, she stepped unbearably close and put her arms around Maura, holding her tightly, resting her chin on Maura's shoulder and letting out a tiny sigh. Maura returned the embrace wholeheartedly.

Jane seemed to sniff out a small chuckle, saying, "I'll miss you." Maura stiffened. "On the honeymoon. You know, because I'll get bored…without a case to solve." Maura relaxed, wrapping her arms just a little tighter around the detective, discreetly inhaling her scent. "Might have to call you once or twice and have you enable my addiction to criminal drama."

Maura smiled. Indulged in a light chuckle. "You'll be back soon enough, and then you'll wish you had stayed away longer."

"Yeah, maybe so, but that doesn't change the fact that…I'll still miss you, Maura. It might be the longest we've been apart in…ever."

Another few seconds passed. Maura gathered the courage to say her piece and walk away. "I love you, Jane. I love you so much, you're my best friend, and I wish you every happiness in the world." She found that she truly meant every word.

The last Unexpected Variable was nearly her undoing. At these words, Jane shivered. Maura could have attributed this to the evening breeze that had picked up as the day drew to a close. They had chosen a partially outdoor venue to take advantage of warm spring weather, and it was entirely possible that Jane had become slightly chilled from standing outside so long in not much clothing. But the timing, the context, everything aside from the meteorological circumstances pointed to this shiver stemming not from the physiology of homeostasis, but rather the physiology of emotion.

Maura found her mind's eye flashing unbidden on a few personal watershed moments in her relationship with Jane.

_Jane allowing herself to be led gingerly to the sidelines in the wake of a fatal car bomb explosion. Jane huddled against her, face hidden in her shoulder, trembling from shock and pain in Maura's arms as BPD milled about, fighting to regroup._

_Jane's arms holding her up in the hospital after the hit-and-run that almost killed Constance. Her hands tenderly cradling Maura's injured ones at Constance's bedside._

_Jane supporting her again after serial killer Dennis almost slit her throat. Cupping her face, her head, squeezing her body to keep her from falling to pieces, making her feel safe again._

_Jane in her arms again when Maura informed her of the risks of Casey's restorative spinal surgery. Sobbing silently, lost and afraid, clinging to her best friend because Maura was the only rock she had to cling to._

Maura sighed, unable to contain so much emotional turmoil for much longer. "And I'll miss you, too."


	8. Chapter 8

Jane pressed back into the headrest of the passenger seat, still trying to adjust to letting someone else drive. Her hand rested comfortably over her husband's, atop the gear shift. He smiled over at her for a moment, and she returned the expression with a sleepy grin of her own. The flight back from the Hawaiian islands had been long, and they were both tired. She closed her eyes, lulled by the rhythmic ticking of the turn signal as Casey changed lanes.

_I'm happy, _she thought, marveling at the novelty of the idea. _This was a decent vacation, and I actually feel okay right now. Content. _"This is good."

"What's that, babe?"

Jane opened her eyes. Squeezed his hand. "This. This is nice."

He chuckled softly. "I'm glad you're happy." As he drew the car to a stop at a traffic light, he leaned over and kissed her. "I love you," he said into her mouth. Jane closed her eyes again, feeling herself respond with a familiar, lazy warmth.

"Mmmmm…love you, too."

_How long can this last?_ Her lids flew up and she pulled away softly. Thankfully, the light had turned green, so her abrupt withdrawal went unnoticed. _Where did that come from? _She sat back in the seat, puzzled at her own subconscious penchant for negativity at a time like this.

_Things are going really well. I have no business doubting right now. _They'd both agreed to leave their cell phones off for the majority of the trip. There had been no hitches in their travel plans, and no interruptions. Their two-week honeymoon had been just about as flawless as Jane knew she could realistically expect it to be. There had been a couple of moments where she would lay awake at night after Casey had flopped to his side of the bed, happy and exhausted. In these moments she would stare at the ceiling or the digital clock on the nightstand, and listen to the ocean sounds wafting through their open window. And she would get an itch in her mind to know what cases her colleagues were working on, if they had any leads, what morbidly fascinating observations Maura made while conducting her autopsy. But the restlessness would be fleeting, easily quelled.

They pulled up to Jane's building, hauled their luggage from the trunk to her bedroom and collapsed, side by side, on the mattress.

"Let's not bother unpacking tonight," Casey said.

Jane snorted. She hadn't been planning on it. "Agreed." They both smiled into the dark.

In companionable silence, Jane slowly, lightly drew her fingertips up and down Casey's forearm.

"Will you go back tomorrow?" he asked.

She turned her head on the pillow to look at him. His eyes were forward, trained on the ceiling. Was this a test? She decided honesty was the best policy. "I was thinking about it." _Is that okay? _she felt like asking, but wanted to avoid emulating the deferential wife stereotype in any way. It was her job, her career, and she was the only one who would decide when her hard-earned vacation was over.

She felt his strong fingers link with hers. "Okay."

_Wait. That's it? Just "okay?"_ This was an easier conversation than she expected. She rolled over to kiss him, and his hands came to her waist, squeezing ever so lightly just beneath her ribs. It was on the verge of a tickling sensation, but the pressure was brief. "Thank you," she murmured with a smile. He smiled back. She lay back down on her back, and he reached over to tenderly brush a wayward lock from her face.

"Good night, beautiful."

"Good night."

Jane awoke feeling refreshed and raring to get back in the swing of things. She was certainly never one to get romantic about her work as a homicide detective, but absence had made her heart grow fonder her job and its myriad associations.

Casey was gone, but that was no surprise. Even in Hawaii he would sometimes get up at oh-dark-thirty for a brief solo jog – even if it was just around the block. Old Army habits die hard. She had even risen early to join him once, but afterwards decided that vacations were for sleeping in.

Whenever he left early in the morning he would be sure to write a note to let her know what he was doing and roughly how long he expected to be gone. It wasn't necessary – he was a grown man and Jane only rarely worried about him – but she appreciated the courtesy, and the love she knew was behind it.

In Hawaii, the notes had been handwritten. Today, however, he must have known she would check her email first thing, and so his name was at the top of her lengthy inbox list.

_Good morning, babe –_

_Hope you have a good day at work. I've gone for a run. You'll probably be gone before I get back. Maybe I'll stop by for lunch?_

_I'll talk to you later._

_Love you!_

_Casey_

With a smile, she closed the message and skimmed through the rest of her inbox. There were a few minor news updates from the precinct. A couple jokes and gag emails from Korsak and Frankie. One from Cavanaugh. One from her mother. And one from Maura. These last three had strikingly similar subject headers, all along the lines of, "we need to talk when you get back." Suddenly nervous, the smile melted from her face as she opened each of them. While cryptic, she got the sense that they were all trying to warn her of some significant changes in the department that she should prepare herself for upon her return. The fact that one of these was from her mother clued Jane to the fact that this was big enough news that it had extended beyond the walls of the bullpen and into civilian territory. Yet it was sensitive enough that they couldn't – or wouldn't – divulge details over email. It was something they each felt a need to address with her in person.

Unable to glean any more helpful information from her inbox, she closed her laptop, slugged down the last of her coffee, and headed for the shower.


	9. Chapter 9

Jane knocked on the open door to Cavanaugh's office. "Sir? I got your email."

"Rizzoli. Welcome back. Come on in." The lieutenant stood and moved to shut the door behind her. "Have a seat."

Between concern, lack of facts, and no breakfast, Jane's coffee wasn't settling well. "What's this about, sir?" She sat forward in the chair, abdomen clenched tightly.

Cavanaugh sighed, staring at his clasped hands on the desk. "Rizzoli, there's really no easy way to tell you this, so…"

"Please, sir, just tell me," Jane begged. She could feel her throat tightening with an unnamed dread. She hated not knowing what was going on.

"Detective Frost is dead."

The breath caught in her throat and her lungs seemed to seize up. "Frost…?" she rasped.

Cavanaugh nodded, refraining from repeating the awful phrase.

Jane slumped back in her seat, stricken. "How…? When…?" she stammered. _He was at my wedding, for God's sake!_

"Homicide and DCU formed a task force for a big bust. The bust went wrong. DCU lost two of their best. And we lost Frost." He met her eyes, his expression tight and grim. "This was a week after you left," he added to orient her chronologically. He rose, and she stood also, feeling wooden and hollow. "I hate to put this on you the moment you return, but –"

"No, I understand." The words came out mechanically.

Cavanaugh followed her to the door. "If you need more time, Rizzoli, to process…figure things out…you're more than welcome."

Jane paused in the doorway, looking out at the bullpen. Her partner was dead. Gone. She managed to look Cavanaugh in the eye as she stepped out. "Thank you, sir, but I don't think that'll be necessary."

Cavanaugh nodded. He seemed to get it. "The service is tomorrow."

Jane nodded over her shoulder. She'd be there. "Sir?"

"Yes?"

"Did they at least…" her voice finally started to crack, "get the guys who did it?"

Cavanaugh nodded. "All but one. And he's done a real good job of disappearing. But the team reported back that he's likely wounded, and can't outrun us too much longer."

It had to be enough. She couldn't stand to listen to any more. As she approached her desk, her gaze wandered aimlessly, landing on various people and landmarks and seeing them only as abstract shapes with no meaning. The news hadn't hit her yet. She was numb with shock.

Noticing curious, pitying glances in her direction, she realized she had been staring at the elevator doors. _Oh God, Maura. I wonder how she's taking it, _Jane thought with a weird sense of desperation. She turned to her desk and sat down, now staring at the blank, powered-down monitor of her computer. None of her body's movements made any sense to her. The detachment was disconcerting, but she couldn't seem to gather enough emotion even to process that revelation fully.

The elevator dinged.

Jane didn't look up.

Maura stepped through, manila case file in one hand, coffee in the other.

Out of her peripheral vision, Jane watched Maura approach her desk and come to a tentative halt.

"Jane," came the soft voice.

The detective looked up, just barely beginning to feel something. The soulful, loving, empathetic hazel eyes that met her halfway were more than she could bear.

"I'm sorry, Maura," she choked out and tore from her desk, fleeing to the nearest restroom. She slammed a stall door behind her, locked it, and sagged to the floor, sobbing breathlessly.


	10. Chapter 10

The restroom door opened with a shushing sound. Maura knew the clack of her heels – however much she altered her gait to minimize noise – would likely alert Jane to her approach. She stopped, letting the door swing shut behind her with a muffled bump. Standing stock still, she listened.

There. There it was.

Her heart clenched at the sound.

Stifled, rib-wracking sobs, barely restrained by what was now likely a tear-stained shirt sleeve.

If she hadn't been paying attention, she might not have heard it.

But Maura Isles always paid attention. Maura Isles always paid attention to Jane Rizzoli.

She felt helpless, useless. She wanted to reach out, to at least say something. Impart words of comfort for her grieving friend, the woman she loved. But she remained firmly rooted to the spot where she had stopped to listen. Aching at the sound as Jane wept, yet inexplicably unable to respond.

_Jane…Oh, Jane. _The familiar globus pharyngis sensation built painfully in her throat. She swallowed ineffectively against it. _What can I do?_

The sobs gradually quieted, replaced by sporadic sniffles. Maura bowed her head. _She is no longer mine to comfort. She never was really mine._

As the room grew quieter, Maura urged her vocal chords to vibrate, and her lips to take the familiar shape of Jane's name.

She could not. Words died in her throat, faded on her tongue. Her best friend was suffering and she could do nothing.

Eventually, even the sniffles stopped, and if she strained she could hear Jane's determined efforts to calm her diaphragm into a regular rhythm. Slow, deliberate breaths. Ujayii breathing.

Maura shook her head and turned silently to the door. Hating her own cowardice.

She passed Jane's desk on her way back to the elevator, and consequently, Frost's empty chair, his desk cleared of all personal touches. Stinging tears threatened with a vengeance. She quickened her pace to the elevator, seeking detachment in the cold sterility of the morgue. Emotionally she felt subterranean. It was fitting that she should descend physically as well.

It took way more strength than she felt she had, but Jane finally managed to get her tears in check and her breathing under control. Yanking several squares of toilet paper off the roll, she wiped her eyes one last time and blew her nose. She wadded up the paper, pitched it in the toilet bowl, took two more deep breaths, and unlocked the stall door. She bumped it open with her knee and went straight to the sink. Her abdomen was sore and she felt vaguely nauseous. Leaning with stiff arms on the counter, she forced herself to make eye contact with her reflection.

She smirked. The aftermath of crying this hard wasn't a look that wore well on anyone. Her face was flushed. Her eyes were bloodshot. A splash of cold water on her face helped only slightly.

She sighed and looked back at herself in the mirror. _Get it together, Rizzoli. You're not honoring Frost or helping anybody else who knew him by all the gross sobbing._ She loosed one more heavy sigh and pushed off the counter.

It was time to get to work.


	11. Chapter 11

Maura glanced at the time on her computer screen. It was probably time for lunch, but the last thing she felt like doing was eating. So she continued to scour the toolmark database for anything that might match the suspicious indentation on the victim's left clavicle bone.

She almost didn't notice the double doors swing open. Even after hearing their swish, she half expected Korsak to come through the doors. She wasn't expecting Jane.

Jane's step remained unusually quiet as she approached. She waited until she was less than three feet away from Maura before she spoke. There was a moment's hesitation, in which Maura wondered numbly why Jane was even down here.

When Jane finally opened her mouth to speak, the slight husk that usually characterized her voice was lower, harsher, and less steady. "You can stare at that screen till your eyeballs melt, it's not gonna change the fact that our "tool" isn't listed there."

Maura glanced up, fleetingly meeting Jane's eyes before returning her gaze to the computer monitor in front of her. "My eyes would never melt from staring at a computer screen, Jane," she corrected, her own voice low and dull. She hesitated to continue along this line of thought; their dialogue already felt painfully contrived after less than sixty seconds. "Though studies have shown that excessive exposure to electronic monitors – phone screens, television, computer monitors – leads to corneal dryness and irritation."

Jane could not suppress a wry smirk. "That explains so much." She crossed her arms and leaned closer to Maura's computer, looking at the time at the bottom of the screen. "Normally we would be eating lunch by now."

"I thought of that as well."

"Not hungry?"

Maura shook her head, quirking one shoulder weakly.

"Me neither. C'mon, let's take a break, anyway. Think we've both earned it, don't you?" Jane gave her arm a gentle tug.

_Jane, _Maura thought, _you have no idea._ She slowly pulled her arm away. Her shoulders began to gather in, and her chin quivered, betraying her.

"Maura…" Jane's hand assumed its usual position on her shoulder and squeezed tenderly. There was no mistaking the telling catch in the detective's voice.

The medical examiner hunched a little further, a feeble attempt at escape without physically removing herself from Jane's presence. Though it hurt, Jane acknowledged Maura's need to retreat. She watched helplessly as a tear escaped Maura's eye. "Okay," she said, squeezing Maura's shoulder one more time. _Frost was her partner, too. He was her family, too. _"Alright, we don't have to go anywhere. If you want to keep working, that's fine. But…" a sigh gusted unbidden from her lungs, and she ran a shaky hand through her wayward tresses. "We should – probably – set aside some time to…you know, talk. About…things."

Maura nodded. Wiped her eyes and sniffed. "Maybe tonight," she managed, and Jane wanted to cheer the suggestion. With the way a huge chunk of her world had just imploded, getting Maura to even tentatively agree so easily left Jane feeling poignantly triumphant.

"Okay. I'll check by later. To see if you're still up for it, okay? Or maybe just text me. Whatever you feel like."

"Okay." Maura nodded again, timorously meeting her best friend's dark eyes. The warmth there, and the pain they shared at the common loss, was oddly reassuring.

Jane gave her back a quick rub, and after a moment's hesitation, gently brushed some locks of red-gold hair off Maura's shoulder.

As the her best friend pulled away and made her exit, it was all Maura could do to not flinch at the way her stomach fluttered and her heart constricted.


	12. Chapter 12

"Korsak, how do you feel about lunch?"

The sergeant looked up from his computer, brows arched in mild surprise. "Love some! Doctor Isles not going with you?"

Jane shook her head. "She wasn't feeling up to it."

Korsak glanced fleetingly at Frost's empty desk. "Understandable. It was a kick to the gut for everybody, but she seemed to take it especially hard. Cavanaugh tell you what happened?"

"He only disclosed the basics. How it happened and when." She shrugged, staring at the empty space where her partner was supposed to be sitting. "I don't think I could've handled any more than that at the time." She met his eyes. "But was there even that much more to tell?"

His face turned grim. "Listen, I've just gotta finish up this report real quick. Go see your mom down at Division One, and I'll meet you there. I can fill you in on details over lunch if you feel ready to hear them."

Jane nodded, feeling shaky but determined. "I think I can take it," she said without irony.

Almost before Jane had crossed the threshold into the Division One Café, her mother was around the counter and calling her name, instantly tearful.

"Jane, honey, have you heard? Has somebody told you?" She seized Jane in a hug before her daughter could dodge.

"Yes, Ma. Cavanaugh told me."

"Oh honey it was just awful. And he was your partner. I'm so sorry, baby."

With a few cursory pats to her mother's shoulder, Jane managed to gently pry herself from her mother's arms. "Thanks, Ma," she said, her treacherous voice beginning to quaver.

"What can I get you?"

Jane hesitated when she saw Frankie enter the café and begin making his way over. "Uh, nothing right now, Ma. I'm getting lunch with Korsak in a bit." _And I get the feeling it'll be a pretty light lunch._

"Hey, Janie," Frankie greeted her, voice low.

"Hi, Frankie." She squeezed his arm. He felt tense. Rather than ask with words, she inquired with her eyes. _How are you holding up? _

He gave her a terse nod, but his face was drawn with melancholy. He looked like a man who had just lost his best friend.

"Frankie, what about you? Can I get you anything special?"

"Nah, Ma, I'm good. Thanks, though. Look, I gotta run. I'll talk to you later, Jane."

Jane understood exactly how he was feeling. "Okay." She offered him a small smile as he turned away.

"He told me he was there, Jane, but he won't say anything else about it."

Jane met her mother's worried eyes. "You can't expect him to be an open book, Ma. Not so soon after it happened."

Angela sighed. "I know, but I just worry about you kids not talking about your problems. It's not healthy."

"You sound like Maura," Jane remarked dryly.

"Well, somebody has to make sense when she's not around! Did you talk to her yet today?"

"Briefly, in the morgue. She's…not doing much better than Frankie, to be honest." Her eyebrows drew together and the muscles between her shoulder blades began to bunch up. _What a royal fucking mess we all are. Frost, why'd you have to go?_

When her mother spoke again, her voice was unsteady. "We all miss Frost, honey," she said, eyes taking in her daughter's mournful gaze and defeated posture. "It's gonna be hard, but we'll get through this, okay?"

_I should call Casey. Tell him what happened. _"She barely spoke to me, Ma."

"Jane! Ready to go?" Korsak's voice carried from café doors to where they stood.

Angela embraced her daughter tightly one more time. "Go talk to Sergeant Korsak, Jane. Remember the good times."

Jane's throat closed, preventing her from replying. She simply nodded and turned to Korsak. She pulled out her phone. "Mind if I have you drive while I call Casey? It dawned on me that I should probably fill him in…"

"Of course, Jane." He pulled out the keys to his sedan and she followed him out the door, phone already to her ear.

Her husband picked up on the third ring. "Hey, babe! Want me to come join you for lunch?"

"Hi. Actually, Casey…I'm sorry, but I'm getting lunch with Korsak. We've got a surprising amount to catch up on." She discreetly brushed the base of her thumb against her nose as her voice cut out on her. Again. As she stepped into the passenger side of the car, she exchanged a glance with Korsak that said, _God, this doesn't get any easier, does it?_

"What's wrong, Jane?" Casey asked.

"Uh…" Jane's stream of consciousness seemed to stutter. She had to say it out loud. It was going to become real the moment the words left her lips. And she knew it was going to hurt like hell. She looked to her ex-partner for help. Korsak's sympathetic expression gave her the boost she needed to plunge ahead. "Frost is dead."

A beat of silence. Then, "Oh, Jane I'm so sorry."

"Yeah, it's, uh…thanks, honey. Look, I gotta go. I can talk more later." Her voice, her heart was breaking on every word. _Frost is dead. Frost is dead. _

"Okay. I understand. I love you."

"Love you, too," she whispered, and ended the call. The phone dropped to her lap as she pressed the heel of her hand to her forehead. Everything ached. She drew a deep breath and held it.

_My partner is dead. And I wasn't here for him._

"God, Korsak, what am I gonna do?"

Korsak knew this for what it was: a rare moment of weakness in the strongest, most resilient woman he knew, aside from Angela Rizzoli. He put the car in drive, not bothering to ask where Jane wanted to go. She didn't need to be burdened with trivial decisions like that. He briefly put his hand over hers. "Do what you have to, and keep living."

She nodded. "Okay."

He managed to find parking not far from the Dirty Robber. Jane was grateful he hadn't taken her someplace new – the comfort of a familiar atmosphere would likely service her well in the not-too-distant future. The lunch crowd was a much quieter and smaller group than the after-work crowd. They found a table in a somewhat secluded corner, and the server was in front of them a moment later. Korsak ordered a salad.

"I promised Doctor Isles I'd try to start eating better a while back. Figure I should probably start keeping my word." He offered a smile, and Jane returned it, albeit weakly.

She also ordered a salad. "I'm probably not going to eat much of it, anyway," she said with a shrug after the server departed. They sipped silently from their iced waters for a moment before Jane finally prompted, "Korsak, you might as well start talking now. Waiting until we get our food isn't going to make this easier on either of us."

He nodded and gave a resigned shrug. "You're probably right. So, how much did Cavanagh tell you?"

"Like I said, just the basics. Homicide plus DCU on a big narc bust. He didn't say what went south, but that it ended with two DCU guys and Frost about to get their names on the "In Memoriam" wall." She lifted the water to her lips and set it down before speaking again. "Oh, and Ma told me that Frankie was there."

Her concise summary of what she knew seemed to give Korsak pause. He watched her take another sip of water, clearly needing some occupation for her hands. When she set the glass down again, she went straight to the napkin wrapped around her silverware, unwound it, and went to work crumpling and uncrumpling it.

Korsak looked away for a second, gathering his thoughts, deciding where best to begin, which details to include and which to omit. Jane knew he didn't want to screw this up. She'd feel the same way in his position. _This wouldn't even be a problem if I'd just been here._

"The bust wasn't far from our precinct. They'd brought a tactical team along and everything. This was a big deal. One of the couriers got to the scene earlier than they'd been expecting, and saw them coming in. His warning gave the perps enough time to prepare." He shrugged, watching her fingers still going to town on the now mutilated napkin. "The rest is history as far as the bust itself is concerned."

Jane looked up from the napkin and looked him straight in the eye. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw the server approaching with their salads. "What happened next?" She knew there had to be more.

"The two DCU guys died almost instantly. Frost, though…" he looked up as the server placed their plates in front of them. "Thanks," he said.

More for appearances than anything else, Jane speared a couple of spinach leaves and steered them around her plate, trying to pick up more dressing and make them palatable.

"Frost was hit in – well, Doctor Isles said it was a freak coincidence that it nailed his femoral artery. If we'd got him back quicker, he might not've…"

Jane closed her eyes. Her lungs felt like they had just shut down. "Maura did the autopsy?" _Oh, God…no wonder she's doing so badly._

"She tried to save him, Jane."

_Oh God._

"They hauled ass back to the precinct. Called 911, telling them to meet us there with the ambulance. He was critical. Blood all over the place." He paused and touched her hand, which was clenched in a white-knuckled fist on the tabletop, still holding her fork with the spinach leaves. "Do you want me to stop?"

She shook her head. Stifled a whimper. "I might as well know it all."

"She did everything she could once he was on her table. I think, if we'd gotten him there sooner, she could've stopped or at least slowed the bleeding enough to hold him 'til the ambulance could take him."

"But he bled out," Jane whispered the conclusion to the story. _Oh Frost. Oh Maura._

Jane pictured herself back in the morgue, seeing things from Maura's perspective.

_Shouting men hauling a wounded Frost through the doors and up on her table. His blood-soaked pants shredded. Femoral artery. That would explain a critical shot with this much blood even when he was wearing Kevlar. The slim chances of that happening were baffling, yet here were the cold, stark facts. _

_Pressing compresses to the wound, elevating his leg. Blood everywhere. _

_Frost opening his eyes. His breath faltering. Looking with startling clarity straight into Maura's face._

_Then nothing._

_Oh, Maura. Honey._

"Have you talked to her yet today?" Korsak asked quietly, venturing to break the stricken silence. "I know she didn't want to go to lunch, but…have you discussed it at all?"

"No. She didn't seem to want to talk." _And now I know why. I should've been here. For her._

"I know you don't like to push her, and I get that, but this might be one of those times when you have to try drawing it out of her. Gently, of course. You know how to handle her better than anyone."

Jane nodded, salad forgotten. "Yeah, I was waiting to see if she'd get back to me later about getting together after work to talk. She'll tell me when she's ready."

"Fair enough. I figured you'd know what's best."

She gave him a grim smile. Looked down at her salad and forced herself to eat enough of it to justify paying for a pile of seasoned leaves on a plate. Korsak followed her lead. They ate the rest of their meal in tentative silence.

Korsak drove them back to the precinct. Just before she opened the door, he stopped her. "Jane."

She turned. She knew what was coming. She wasn't going to heed his admonition, but she would do him the courtesy of listening.

"Don't beat yourself up. You had no way of knowing or anticipating this. It happened, and it's terrible, but it's over now. The best we can do is keep working through. I know how you think, Jane. And none of this was in any way your fault."

She turned and swung open the door without another backward glance.


	13. Chapter 13

Jane slipped the last sheaf of paperwork into its folder and stashed the folder in the file box beneath her desk for ease of retrieval tomorrow. She had been feeling less than productive all day, but still managed to get enough done to feel okay about leaving at quitting time. Shoving the box underneath the desk with her foot, she leaned back in her chair with a heavy sigh. She was so weary in body and spirit. It felt as though a lump of lead had settled at the bottom of her stomach. She grasped a pen from her desk and began clumsily twirling it between her fingers, silently debating whether to go straight home or ask Maura if she was ready to talk. She hadn't heard from her best friend all day since their brief exchange in the morgue that morning. The thought didn't sit well with Jane. But she was loath to push Maura's boundaries when she so clearly needed space and time to process.

As if summoned by her thoughts, the elevator dinged and Maura stepped onto the homicide floor. She wore a simple white blouse over a black skirt, with a coral blazer completing the ensemble. Stylish and professional.

"Hey, Maura."

"I'm sorry I didn't get back to you all day. I…needed time."

Jane put out her hand, forehead creasing in sympathy. "That's okay! I get it. I do." She knew the story now. She would give Maura all the time she needed. Her silent avowal to demonstrate infinite patience with her best friend seemed such a small penance for her failure to be there in a time of such crisis. "You don't have to apologize to me, Maura."

The medical examiner seemed to struggle with this sentiment, a fleeting grimace marring her features for a moment before she spoke again. "Anyway, I came here to tell you I'm ready to talk about it. And I –" she faltered, seemingly at war with herself on whether she should finish the sentence. She quickly came to a decision and lifted her chin. "I was wondering if you wanted to come over tonight. We can have dinner…or not, and just skip straight to the wine." She offered a small smile, dimples just barely beginning to show themselves.

Jane's heart melted at the sight. She opened her mouth to accept.

Her phone buzzed. "Ugh. Perfect timing," she groaned, and checked the screen.

_Casey: Babe, just wondering if you're coming home soon._

She looked up at Maura. "It's Casey. Sorry, just give me one sec."

She typed a response. _Sorry honey. Maura's having a tough time of it with the Frost thing. I'm going over to hers for a while. Don't wait up for me. Love you._

His response was prompt in returning. _Got it. Love you too._

She locked the screen and returned her gaze to Maura's with a smile of her own. "Okay, I told him not to wait up for me." Jane felt an inexplicable lightening within herself as she watched Maura's expression turn from anxious doubt to happy relief. She rose and pulled her blazer off the back of her chair. "Let's go."

As Jane drew even with her on their approach to the elevator, she couldn't help but catch the frown that had returned to Maura's face. She was overthinking again. Jane sighed, wishing there was more she could think to do to make this easier on her friend.

Suddenly, there was a warmth on her arm, seeping through the sleeve of her blazer. She looked down. Maura had wrapped her hand around her arm. Jane took that hand as the elevator doors slid open, and pulled it gently until their arms were linked. They stayed this way the entire descent to the ground floor.

"God, I hope you still have beer in your fridge," Jane groaned loudly as they entered Maura's house.

In spite of her weariness with the turns their lives had taken recently, Maura found herself laughing softly at Jane's melodramatics. She was glad that some things remained the same when so much was in flux. And though the embers that always burned in her heart for the detective would never be quenched since Casey had staked his claim, Maura was not going to deprive herself of the small joys Jane's company could still bring her. So long as her best friend was willing to humor and indulge her now and again, Maura would content herself with that.

She went to her fridge and retrieved the much sought-after Blue Moon while Jane pulled her boots off. "Thanks for coming over, Jane," she said as she handed the bottle to the detective.

Seeming to sense Maura's earnestness, Jane grew solemn. "Don't mention it. I will always be here for you when you need me."

Maura felt some of the cold, hard tension from grief that had gathered in her abdomen begin to warm and soften. She was melting inside, and it had never felt so good. Or so terrifying. Jane could affect her so easily. Without even trying. Without even intending to attain Maura's surrender, the detective had it without realizing.

"I think we should both just drink heavily tonight and then go to bed," Jane said dryly.

"But…one of us has to get you back home to your husband, Jane." Maura tilted her head, eyes narrowed slightly.

Jane shrugged, carelessly flicking a few wayward locks of raven hair from her face as she took another drink. She was already well into the bottle.

Maura pressed her lips into a tight line. _Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. Maybe I'm being too selfish. Too needy._

"He knows not to wait up for me. I told him where I am. And I'm sure he wouldn't want either of us taking the risk of driving under the influence, only to have me stumble in at – what? – two in the morning? When he usually gets up at four to go run, anyway." She shook her head. "Nah, I think I'll stay here with you. That is," she met Maura's eyes cautiously, hoping she hadn't overstepped, "if you'll still have me."

"Of course, Jane," Maura said after a moment. "If you're comfortable with it, then so am I."

"Good. It's settled, then." Jane made her way over to the couch, but didn't turn on the TV. Instead, she tugged on the blanket that was draped over the back cushions, and laid it over herself. She took another sip and set her bottle down, settling into the corner of the couch and leaning her head back.

Surreptitiously watching her, Maura was overcome with intense affection – and desire. She stepped around the couch and joined Jane. But she did not settle in like her friend. She remained tense, hyperaware. Elbows propped on her knees, Maura sat forward with her back bent, staring into the glass of Carignan on the coffee table in front of her. She continued to watch Jane as she breathed, eyes still closed. Maura wondered if she was already falling asleep, but decided it wasn't very likely.

A want that seemed so basic it was almost primal was pulling and tugging at the corners of her being. Her soul felt stretched taut. _Why? _she thought, taking a heavy swallow from her glass. She had long since given up on trying to understand her relationship with Jane in a scientific context. But there were still times when she wondered at the cause and effect of it all.

Jane's arm reached out and deftly picked up the bottle, bringing it to her lips. She opened her eyes and looked right at Maura as she swallowed. "Hey. You okay?"

Maura held her gaze for a second longer and then looked away. If Jane really did stay the night, coping with temptation was going to make the next several hours extremely difficult. Jane polished off the last of the beer and reached out, touching Maura's shoulder. She began a series of very slow, very light, back-and-forth movements across Maura's back. Maura felt her breath catch, but she didn't think Jane heard it. Or if she did, she gave no sign of it.

Maura brought her glass up and took another large swallow. She was making much shorter work of it than she had planned. _Control. Keep it together. Yes, it's Jane, you're both grieving, you're both drinking, but you can control yourself._

Jane's hand continued its soft strokes, up and down her spine, and across her shoulders. "You wanna talk now?"

Maura closed her eyes for a moment, letting the sensation of Jane's touch and nearness wash over her. Tears gathered behind her eyes. _My amygdala and my lachrymal gland have a connection that I can't really control._

"If it helps," Jane offered, "Korsak already told me everything that happened. Including your…" she searched for the right word, "involvement. I'm all filled in. So you can really just talk about whatever is on your mind about the whole thing. You don't have to retell the story if you don't want to. I know reliving it is probably the last thing you wanna do right now."

The solemn timbre of Jane's voice dwindled to a mere susurration of whispered consonants. Maura opened her eyes finally, and looked at Jane. The detective sat forward, her hand never leaving Maura's back. She could sense the words were on their way out.

The veneer of placidity crumbled away as Maura finally choked out a whisper. "I couldn't save him, Jane. I tried everything…_everything_, but it was too late. I lost him. I lost your partner. I couldn't…" spasms wracked her diaphragm and she struggled, gasping for breath. Jane leaned closer and gripped her shoulders. "I couldn't save Frost, Jane, and I'm so, so s-sorry."

"Maura. Honey. It's not your fault." Tears flowed hot and fast from Jane's eyes as well, and her throat constricted painfully. She leaned her forehead against Maura's shaking shoulders. "I should've been here. For Frankie, for Korsak, for Frost. For you. And I wasn't. _I'm _sorry, Maura. I'm so sorry, sweetheart. You shouldn't have had to face that alone." And she held onto Maura so tightly, as if the pressure of her hands was the only physical force holding the pieces of her fragile best friend together.

Maura shook her head but couldn't speak. It was all too much to give words to, too much to take in. Frost's death, Jane's grief, her own grief, her private yearning for Jane to return her love. Instead, she tucked herself into Jane as her best friend wrapped her arms tightly around her. Much as she always longed for this, it hurt a great deal. Because under normal circumstances, Maura knew she had no right to such intimacy with this woman. So while half her heart lavished in the warmth and safety of Jane's affection, the other half writhed in agony at the knowledge that Jane was not hers. Would never be hers. Unable to stop herself, Maura wept harder.

Jane sobbed silently with her.


	14. Chapter 14

When the fluttering in her diaphragm finally settled, Maura felt like she was waking from a heavy sleep. _Perhaps I was unconscious for a time. _She didn't quite remember. After a while she lost all awareness of time and her surroundings. The only sensations she could remember were those of her own distress and Jane's constant presence. Jane's arms around her. The shudders of intense grief passing in breathtaking waves between them.

Her heart seemed to flinch within her when she realized she could hear Jane's pulse directly beneath her ear.

Jane, at some point in the past hour, had leaned them both back against the couch, Maura pressed against her. Maura lifted her head carefully to look at Jane. The other woman's breathing had also slowed and evened out, though her heart still beat slightly quicker than normal. Jane was staring at the ceiling, expression inscrutable, face pale with exhaustion. Maura could but barely make out the tear tracks that were just now beginning to dry on her cheeks. It appeared that the last set had fallen quite recently from her eyes, whereas Maura's ducts seemed to have ceased production some time ago. Yet there remained what felt like a hardened core of internalized stress, pent-up and tense, crowding her internal organs. She knew there was no physical mass to speak of in the midst of her digestive tract, yet the sensation was palpable and latent within her. All her tears were not yet spent.

Jane's eyes roamed down to meet hers. The medical examiner felt a subsequent squeeze at her shoulder. "Mind if I get up? I need another beer."

In reply, Maura shifted and pulled back so Jane could leave the couch. Hearing the refrigerator pop open in the kitchen behind her, she leaned forward and finished the last of the Carignan in her glass. As she swallowed, she vaguely regretted letting it sit so long in the open. A very slight harshness had crept into its bouquet. It was far from becoming vinegar, but it was clear this glass was well past "needing to breathe."

Jane returned with another Blue Moon – freshly opened – in her right hand, and the bottle of Maura's Carignan in her left. She poured a generous serving into Maura's glass – far fuller than would have been deemed socially appropriate in a formal setting – and resumed her position next to Maura.

"Thank you," Maura murmured as she took a sip. She watched Jane over the rim of her glass as the detective took two deep swallows before setting the bottle down on the end table behind her. Both their eyelids were growing heavy, but they remained awake, each secretly breathing the other in.

Numbness and apathy beckoned to them both, and they gave in, responding to the promise of release with eager swallows. Occasionally, Jane would close her eyes and just shake her head, unable to find words even in her own mind to force some sense on the situation. She unconsciously pressed her hand to Maura's leg and left it there, heavy and relaxed. Though the wine had naturally slowed her reaction time and lowered her inhibitions, she still felt tension gathering gradually within her, starting at the point of contact between herself and Jane.

"What is it?" Jane whispered. "You…flushed all of a sudden." She seemed to struggle with the urge to press the back of her hand to Maura's forehead.

Maura shook her head. "It's hard. I'm just…still trying to process." She looked Jane in the eye, feeling brave. "I can't help but keep thinking…"

"What?"

"No," Maura muttered, averting her gaze. Hating her cowardice all over again. "I don't even have the right to think it."

"You're not making sense, Maur. Just tell me what's going on in there." She gestured vaguely to Maura's head, and then lowered her hand to tuck a strand of warm blonde hair behind her ear.

Maura ducked her head. Here came the tears that had been threatening since Jane sat back down. "I keep seeing Frost's face. I keep seeing him on the autopsy table. I keep seeing the blood." She looked at her free hand - the one not in Jane's lap. Took a long, deep breath. "And I can't help but keep thinking…that could just as easily have been you on my table, Jane." She wept without sobbing this time, the words coming out clear and steady, but a mere whisper. Tears dripped from her chin.

Jane reflexively brushed them from her face and shifted closer.

Maura's insides stirred and grew uncomfortably warm. _I need to not want her. Just for once._

"But it wasn't me, Maura." She swiped more tears away with soft, easy strokes. "Honey, it wasn't me. I'm right here." She grabbed Maura's hand and pressed it to her own heart with both scarred palms.

Maura closed her eyes. Felt Jane's pulse. Reveled in it, just for a moment.

"Jane," she began, voice shaking, eyes still closed. "I need you to understand something."

Her friend remained silent. She could feel those probing dark eyes on her, searching desperately for something – she couldn't possibly know what. Jane kept Maura's hand clasped in both of hers, but lowered the tangle of fingers to her lap.

It was all Maura could do not to pull away. "I couldn't have survived if it had been you that day."

"I know, Maur. It would've been hard no matter –"

Maura's eyes snapped up to Jane's. "Do you, Jane? Know? Sometimes it baffles me. How much – how much you've come to mean to me." She looked down at her lap. "Too much, I think."

Concerned etched her best friend's features. "Maura you've lost me."

_She thinks it's the wine talking._ _Maybe it is. _But Maura knew that tonight's alcohol consumption had merely freed up the truths she had been tamping down for weeks, months. Years, even. "I just don't want there to be any regrets. Nothing left unsaid between us." She pivoted on the couch cushion, facing Jane straight on. "I love you, Jane."

Jane seemed to freeze, her fingers gripping Maura's hand just a little tighter. "I love you, too, Maura."

_She's wondering where this is coming from._

"No, Jane. Again, you're not hearing me. You can't mean this much to me. I can't allow it anymore." Jane looked more confused by the second but Maura had to press forward before she lost her nerve. Before the wave she was riding crested and broke beneath her. "I am _in _love with you, Jane." And here the tears came again. _God, I've waited too long to say this aloud. _"But I can't – that is, it is a moot point, as you've given every indication that it is…you chose Casey, I was your maid of honor…clearly all the signs point to the irrevocable, irrefutable truth that my feelings are, in fact, _not _returned, and I –"

"They _are _returned, Maura." Jane's eyes were zeroed in blankly on an indistinct point somewhere on the coffee table.

Maura's entire body seized into absolute stock stillness as the words registered.

Jane sounded stricken as she repeated herself. "Your feelings are returned." She pulled back abruptly, left hand shooting straight to her temple, fingers raking back through dark, tousled locks. Her expression grew tight, but the emotion it was registering was one that Maura was not adept at interpreting. The emotion was too complex, but Maura feared she understood it – on what Jane would call a "gut" level.

Jane fairly sprang from the couch, sweeping her bottle up and beginning to pace erratically in tiny, irregular circles. She slugged back several more swallows, face growing more pained by the breath. Finally she set the near-empty bottle down and leveled those impenetrably dark eyes straight at Maura.

"_Why?_" Her typical husk had been reduced to a hoarse rasp. "Why did you never _tell _me, Maura?" She sounded like a woman falling apart at the seams, and it rent Maura's heart in two.

Maura's jaw worked, mouth opening and closing. She breathed, but could find no words. "I…I had no idea…"

"Maura, why did you think it was so hard for me to ask you to _be _my maid of honor? Why did you think I felt so awkward?"

_What's she's really asking me is, "Why did I let her go through with all this when the signs should have been clear as day?"_

"There were so many times you could have said something! Why didn't you?"

Maura rose then. She had to - for at least this once - meet Jane on something that resembled an equal footing. "When would it have made sense? When would it have been convenient for you, Jane?"

"Don't put this on me, Maura. You can't dump a confession of this...this magnitude on someone and then turn around and -"

"Answer my question, Jane. Would you have listened?" She flashed again on their exchange in the park about Jane's ankle injury - and her maddening obstinacy. "When would you have been prepared to hear me say this to you? When - prior to now - would you have been ready and able and willing to take my words - and the feelings behind them - into account, and to admit that you returned them?"

It was clear by Jane's expression that she had no retort for that. Maura had soundly stumped her again. Through her frustration, she felt vindicated. Jane confirmed by her uncharacteristic silence that Maura was right. That she knew Jane better than Jane knew herself.

The confirmation made this conversation no easier, did not lessen the pain of the circumstances. In fact, it infuriated Maura that she was correct, yet again. She had never thought she would ever resent her own powers of deduction. And though she had clearly missed the signs that her affections were requited, every other conjecture she had ever formed on Jane's personality and behavioral patterns was perfectly on point.

As she thought all this, she never stopped watching Jane. She was forever trying to take as much of this woman in as she possibly could. Jane's expression was changing, and her pacing had come to a restless stop. She swallowed, exhaled heavily through her nose. That tiny cluster of muscles in the corner of her jaw quivered. Maura wondered if Jane was even aware of that.

She looked on the verge of something. She was tilting, leaning over the precipice. Looking down, losing her balance. For the first time, Maura found herself wanting to see Jane fall. To see her come tumbling after, the same way Maura had come - no means of stopping, head over heels.

Then Jane turned, raking slender fingers through her hair again, shaking the wild curls loose into a black mane. Stepped around the coffee table. Maura stiffened as she approached, closing the distance between them to a few mere inches. Warm brown eyes darkened and bored into hazel.

"What're you doing?" Maura whispered, her own voice ragged from drinking and crying. There was a woman - at once all hard, sharp angles and sleek, graceful curves - standing in front of her, and Maura wondered angrily how either of them could've successfully denied their mutual attraction for so long. But this woman was married to a man who loved her, and whom she loved in return. Their relationship clearly had its flaws, but theirs was a bond already sealed in body and law. What hope could Maura possibly have now for her relationship with Jane? Hers was a lost cause, was it not?

"I have to know. Now. What...could've been. If we both hadn't been so stupid." Maura had never heard Jane's voice sound like this before. She shivered, fearful and inexplicably excited. Jane drew impossibly closer. The left hand once more roamed its way into that tangle of raven hair.

Then both hands were unexpectedly at Maura's waist, fingertips coaxing her closer of their own volition. This was Jane acting on instinct.

Maura stood her ground as Jane pressed in. As their lips met. Something undefined sealed itself inexorably between them. To Maura, it felt like an irreparable rift had spread, jagged between them. And it felt like the last few threads that had been intertwining gradually over the years finally bound themselves together in an unbreakable link. It was a falling away and a falling together.

Slender, eloquent hands moved from waist to shoulders. She felt a single shudder pass through Jane as she took control, something Maura hadn't predicted. She had anticipated hesitancy, apprehension. Not this desperate boldness. But then what about this interaction could realistically have gone according to plan? There were too many variables to account for.

And all of them were Jane.

Maura trembled as their mouths repeatedly came together. She was tasting Jane. Feeling Jane like she never had before.

Jane felt hands on her upper arms, and for the briefest of heady seconds, she felt them soften, clinging. But then their grip strengthened and pressed. Resisting.

Just as quickly as she had moved in, Jane drove back. Her hands released Maura's shoulders. The darkness left her eyes and the rush of blood drained from her face, leaving her once again pale, grief-stricken, and utterly exhausted. But there was something new there, as well. Maura could see it.

Dissatisfaction. Frustration. Jane turned from her and stalked off toward the hall.

"Where are you going?" Maura croaked.

"To bed, Maura." But Maura could see she was walking not to the master bedroom like she normally would, but to the guest room at the end of the hall. She intended to sleep alone.

All at once, Maura's knees buckled and she sank to the couch, shaking. She buried her face in her hands.

"There is no going back," she whispered brokenly. And the last of that toughened, quivering core of tension somewhere in her abdomen gave way, stealing her breath in same merciless way that Jane had inadvertently stolen her heart.

And Maura wept the hardest she had in perhaps her entire life.


	15. Chapter 15

Jolting awake, Jane's eyes snapped open and she stiffened. This was not her bed. This was not her room. There was no one on the mattress beside her.

No Casey. No Maura.

_Maura. _

_Shit. _Last night's dialogue came flooding back to her. Maura's voice floated, unbidden through her mind. _"I am _in _love with you, Jane." _And Jane relived her own stunning realization that her long suppressed feelings for Maura were mutual.

_I kissed Maura last night. _Jane went limp in defeat, limbs sinking into the mattress.

She remembered grieving with Maura at the loss of her partner. Frost.

Jane groaned. _Frost is dead. His funeral is today. Shit. I'm in love with my best friend, who loves me back, but I'm married; my partner is dead and his funeral is today. _She sat up abruptly and raked her fingers through her tousled hair. Then she pitched forward and buried her face in her hands. She sat this way for a moment, then sighed heavily, peeking through her fingers at the clock on the nightstand. It was just after four a.m. _They'll probably expect me to speak at the service. God, what do I even say? _

_What do I say to Maura? How will we ever get back to normal? _But she already knew the answer to that. She'd passed the point of no return. _Hell, was there ever a "normal" between us to begin with?_

After a brief shower, Jane slipped into the main living area to retrieve her shoes on the way to the front door. As she passed between the kitchen and the living room, she heard a soft sigh. She froze. The sound, faint though it was, was clearly coming from the couch. Pivoting slowly, Jane peered over the back of the couch.

There she was. Maura. Curled in on herself, right where Jane had left her late last night. With a fresh wave of gut-clenching guilt, Jane realized Maura had probably cried herself to sleep, too distraught to even get herself to bed. Jane shuddered and gripped the back of the couch. She closed her eyes against a fresh onslaught of grief and then released her white-knuckled grasp on the cushions.

Maura inhaled and shifted on the couch. Jane's eyes were drawn to her forlorn sleeping form huddled on the cushions. "Oh Maura," she whispered under her breath. The medical examiner didn't even have the blanket over her, and her nearly fetal position belied the chill that she was somehow sleeping through.

Jane gathered the blanket from the far corner of the couch and drew it slowly, lightly, over Maura's body. She dared to let her fingertips linger, smoothing the folds of the blanket unnecessarily over her best friend's shoulder, back, and hip. Maura stirred again, and Jane went still, hoping she hadn't woken her friend. But Maura merely sighed again in her sleep. The combination of watching Maura sleep, watching her disturbed expression slowly relax, and hearing the soft sigh caused a fluttering in her abdomen and a squeezing in her heart. She brushed a stray lock of red-gold hair from Maura's shoulder and started to lean down to place a kiss on her cheek but stopped herself short.

_Don't push it, _she thought. _Don't wake her. You'll just have to start making amends later._

"I _do _love you, Maura," she murmured. "I just don't know what to do about it anymore."

"Jane! Good morning! Isn't this a little early for you?" Casey jogged up in gym shorts and a t-shirt, checking his watch.

Jane paused with her hand on the knob of her front door. "Yeah, I guess it is." She shrugged resignedly. "Didn't get much sleep last night, to be honest."

Her husband's expression grew sympathetic as he stepped up to kiss her. "I'm sorry, babe. I know it's hard."

"Did you ever…lose soldiers? In Iraq?" She pushed the door open and they both stepped inside.

While it clearly wasn't his favorite topic, he didn't shy away from sharing. "A few," he admitted with a shrug. "Not as many as it could've been. But even one is too many."

Jane nodded, flashing on Frost yet again. Would it ever get easier to accept the fact that her partner's smiling face would no longer be a part of her daily routine? She made a beeline for the bedroom while Casey headed into the kitchen.

"I thought you would have headed straight to work from Maura's?" his voice came from the kitchen, accompanied by the sound of the running faucet. Jane rifled through the contents of her closet, scanning for that one hanger that was always encased in a suit bag.

"Normally, I would," she called back. "But Frost's memorial service is today and…" she trailed off, her voice catching. Tears welled, blurring her vision, and she clutched the sleeve of one of her blazers in a white-knuckled fist as her chest tightened with restrained sobs. _Don't cry don't cry don't cry don't cry…_

She cleared her throat and managed to finish the sentence without sounding too strangled. "And I needed to pick up my uniform."

He came to stand quietly in the doorway as she pulled her uniform from its bag and hanger and laid it on the bed. "Is everything okay, Jane?"

She froze for a moment, her back to him, fingertips resting lightly on the badge pinned to the front of her dress blues. "No. It's not. I can't lie and pretend everything is okay. Because it's not." She shook her head, pressed her lips together. She couldn't bring herself to turn around and face her husband. To face the sympathy and concern in his eyes. She couldn't let him see her crumble.

"Well," he murmured, "if you ever want to talk about it, with someone not associated with the precinct, I'm –"

"I'm not one of your wounded vets that you can fix with words of sympathy and encouragement," she snapped. Instant regret flooded her in a hot wave. She turned, then, and dared to look at his face.

His gaze on her was heated with hurt, his jaw tight with restrained anger. Clearly he was biting his tongue.

"Look, Casey," she said with a grimace, shoulders slumping. "Baby, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make light of the work you've done. It's wonderful, how you help those guys who come back and don't know what to do with themselves." His face softened. Mollified. "But I have to figure out what to do myself. On my own. There are things that I have to do," she pressed her palm to her chest, "things I have to think about, that…don't include you. They can't. I need to handle it alone right now. I'm sorry."

He looked lost, fumbling for what to say next. She could see the confusion in his eyes, how he had reached out to help her and could not understand why she wasn't reaching back. "We really should discuss this at some point," he admonished halfheartedly. "I just want to help, Jane."

"I know. I know you do." She sighed. "And we will. Just not…now."

He nodded, conceding reluctantly. He lingered a moment, looking as though he wanted to go to her, embrace her, kiss her, perhaps. But he eventually gave up, correctly reading her body language as that of a wounded animal. He turned and left the room.

_And so it begins, _Jane thought with a quiet sigh. She had seen this coming the moment she found out Frost had been killed. But even knowing it would happen, she felt powerless to stop it. She had always dreaded that this would happen one day. In fact, she'd anticipated with painful certainty that it would. That something would happen, something so painful that she would have no idea what to do with herself, and in a last-ditch desperate effort of emotional self-preservation, she would isolate herself from everyone she ever cared about. That she would drive away and alienate those who strove to "be there" for her, because she couldn't stand the thought of dragging them down into the same darkness she was slipping toward. Knowing herself, knowing how she tended to operate, she feared this would happen when the possibility of marrying Casey became real.

She just didn't expect it would happen this soon.


	16. Chapter 16

Maura stepped out of her Prius to find a modest crowd already beginning to gather at the burial site just outside Boston. When her cigarette heels hit pavement, she shut the car door behind her and checked her watch; it was nine-thirty. With the service slated to begin at ten that morning, she sighed in relief that she wasn't late. She had awoken much later than she intended; the combination of the emotionally trying conclusion to her night and falling asleep on the couch – instead of in her bed – served to give her a restless night. The break in her routine made her forget to set her alarm. It was by the providence of sheer force of habit that she woke up with adequate time to shower and dress for the funeral.

As she approached the gathering, she scanned for familiar faces – the faces of those with whom she would most like to stand next to during the formalities preceding Frost's body's subterranean descent. She glanced over Korsak and Cavanagh until her eyes found Jane, in full uniform, standing at the side of the coffin that was furthest from Maura. Coffee-colored eyes were downcast, fixated on an indistinct point in the grass at her feet. Dark circles – periorbital discoloration – crouched beneath them.

Maura was disheartened – but not surprised – to see her beloved friend so utterly dejected and sleep-deprived. So many times, Jane had been her strength when she felt she had so little of her own. Consequently, when the detective's dynamic personality became lackluster with defeat, Maura feared there was precious little hope for herself. It frightened her.

Jane shifted her weight slightly, and the movement was enough to render Casey visible from Maura's vantage point. He stood just behind Jane, face grim, jaw set. He reached for Jane when she appeared to shudder, but to Maura's surprise, the detective shrugged her husband off. He hesitated a moment, lingering at her shoulder and uncertain. Jane inclined her head slightly and murmured something to him over her shoulder, to which he replied only by turning slowly on his heel and striding over to wait beneath the shade of a live oak tree.

Maura felt her shoulders slump as she watched the silent drama unfold before her. Jane had begun to push, to alienate those closest to her. The medical examiner knew from firsthand experience that her best friend would, in the coming weeks and months, proceed to draw her stoicism around herself like a chainmail straightjacket – at once trying to shore up her crumbling defenses, protect her raw and wounded heart, and suppress her deepest emotions in an effort to become numb.

It wouldn't work. It never did.

Those who loved Jane most – who loved her best – would suffer the greatest hurt from her rejection. Maura found herself dreading the foreseeable future, apprehension gnawing at her insides even as she drew up beside Jane just in time for the service to begin. She risked a glance into that heartbreakingly beautiful face and found tears standing in her eyes, perching precariously on long, dark lashes. Jane hardly seemed to notice she was there. She was shutting down already, hands balled into fists so tight that the knuckles and scar tissue stood out in stark relief against the pale olive of her skin.

Seeing Jane like this, knowing how hard she was trying to "stay strong" and hold it together, to keep it all in, Maura ached all the more. She longed all the more deeply to reach out to Jane. She found herself empathizing with Casey, of all people, understanding his desire to give comfort as it came in direct conflict with Jane's determination to isolate herself.

Coping with this internal struggle on top of the renewed grief she felt at Frost's loss proved exhausting for Maura. She was afraid the stress of such intense cognitive dissonance would induce a bout of hives, but she found a strange relief when it came time for Jane to step up to the podium and say a few words.


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N : **I want to extend my deepest and sincerest gratitude to all of you for reading and reviewing this story - and for sticking with it so far. Those of you who have expressed your frustrations with certain characters have been noted, and your frustrations will not be in vain, I promise. For now, this is me just stretching my angst muscles, as it were. People in love do stupid things sometimes. People in denial also do stupid things sometimes. People in mourning do stupid things sometimes. Just remember, I'm trying to keep our ladies human, and right now they're dealing with all three emotional states at once - even if they may not be fully aware of it. Give them some grace. The struggles now will, I hope, make the resolution all the sweeter when it does come. Until then, please continue to be patient, and enjoy the ride! Thanks again, I love you all a ton, and continue to share your thoughts! I love reader feedback of any variety.

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She had felt it when Maura had come to stand beside her. She hadn't been able to feel anything else up to that point. Even standing in place, fixing her gaze on a single point on the ground, Jane had felt as though she was adrift, impervious to gravity in the most disconcerting sense. Casey's attempts to reassure her with physical affection failed to have any impact. In fact, she felt even more lost and confused with him at her side.

_Why does it feel like I don't know what I'm doing anymore? _she thought.

Then Maura seemed to materialize beside her.

Suddenly, that was air she was breathing.

That was the ground she could feel under her shoes.

Those were Maura's fingertips almost brushing her sharply protruding knuckles.

All her thoughts and emotions bled together and left her floating in an incomprehensible blur, but Maura anchored her. Maura's presence – the warmth she radiated – was the first thing Jane had actually _felt_ that day.

But Jane was left with little time to process this, as Cavanagh was just finishing his turn at the podium. Jane knew she was next. She drew a deep, bracing breath in and sighed it out, risking a sidelong glance at Maura as she did so. Tear tracks shown on her best friend's cheeks as she gazed at the coffin. Jane was missing her partner, and that hurt. But seeing Maura weeping silently like this was a far worse pain in that moment.

She stepped forward and traded places with the lieutenant at the podium. She dreaded public speaking. Always had. But Frost was her partner. It made sense she would have to share a few brief words in his honor. Now facing the gathering of people who had come to pay their respects, she scanned the faces while she gathered her thoughts. She briefly reviewed the hastily scrawled notes she'd penned early that morning before she left her apartment. After she'd emotionally slammed the door in her husband's face. She glanced down at her hands, drew another breath, and looked up directly at Frost's parents. His mother gave her a tearful but encouraging nod. Bolstered by this, Jane plunged ahead.

"Um," she shifted her weight slightly. _Get it together, Rizzoli. One thing at a time. Just…say it like you're talking to Korsak. Or Maura. Say it to Maura. _She made fleeting eye contact with her best friend. It was enough to get her going. "Detective Barry Frost was…a rare gem. Even as a rookie detective, he had qualities that you couldn't teach. As partners, we'd been through our share of tough interviews – breaking bad news to friends and family that victims left behind. Detective Frost – Barry – always treated each person as if their time was as valuable to us as it was to them.

"You see a lot of terrible things in this line of work. You see the very worst that human beings are capable of." She gave a small shrug. "That's just the reality of it. In the beginning of a career in law enforcement, you might lose a couple of nights' sleep over a difficult case here and there." Here she paused a moment, cursing what she was now convinced was her own manifestation of PTSD. Hoyt's colorless eyes and deeply lined face loomed in her mind for a moment. She struggled with the next few words, consulting her notes again so as not to lose her place. "And I'd be lying if I said it gets easier to deal with. 'Easier' is not the right word. Every detective – every cop – eventually finds their own way to cope. Some cops get to the point where basically nothing phases them.

"But Frost…" her throat began to close. There were so many memories she hadn't sifted through yet. She looked down again. Breathed, gathered herself. When she raised her eyes, they locked on Maura of their own accord. It seemed like she and Maura, regardless of how lost they felt, would always find each other. She hoped it was true. Maura managed an encouraging smile, and Jane couldn't help feeling that the tears now freshly falling from her best friend's eyes were not merely from mourning, but from pride as well. Yes, that tearful smile seemed to say, "I'm proud of you, Jane." The thought steadied her enough to continue. "Frost wasn't like that. He never…got to that point. He never lost his sense of humor, his ability to make us laugh when we needed it. But more importantly," here she abandoned her notes and looked out at the small gathering, "he never stopped caring. He never got so tired that he just quit, never got so angry and frustrated that he gave up. I think his compassion and his empathy for other people always won out. It seems like a liability when you're in the field and you feel that way. It feels like…like you're being weak." Her she found herself looking Korsak in the eye. So much passed between herself and the sergeant in that breath of a moment. "But really," she gripped the edges of the podium a little tighter, her voice cracking, "I think it was his greatest strength.

"As cops, we're all motivated by the pursuit of justice. That's why we train, why we go out and risk our necks sometimes," here again she found Maura's eyes, "and why, some other times, we spend hours hunched in front of computers or flipping through piles of case files looking for answers. We defend and we uphold the law because it's our job, the job we chose. Frost always reminded me that…our job doesn't stop at enforcing the law. It's not just 'protect.' It's 'protect and _serve._'" She tore her eyes from Maura's and made eye contact with Frost's mother again. She was beaming through her tears. Jane almost couldn't continue. "Frost didn't just want to protect people. He wanted to serve them. That's what made him special. Why he was such a joy to work with every day. And why," tears slid unbidden from her eyes and her voice threatened to fail her, but she found Maura's eyes again and pushed through until she was breathless, "why I am so proud to have called him my partner."

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**A/N: **Be forewarned, there will be some serious Casey in the next chapter, but he'll fade out of the story pretty quickly after that. I don't want to say any more, as I am very anti-spoiler. Thanks for bearing with my interpretation of the characters.


	18. Chapter 18

Maura watched her step down from the podium, those dark eyes on hers so openly wounded. It took Maura's breath away. Jane seemed only able to look at her, only able to see her. Jane's escaped tears had since been dashed away, but Maura couldn't help but see the pain that was still there in her gaze, couldn't help but imagine the tears were still falling. She had to look away. Those dark irises absorbed her, magnetized her into whatever emotion roiled behind them. This frightened Maura. It had frightened her last night, and it frightened her all the more now. It was an effect she could never reason away.

More to the point, she didn't want to.

In tearing her glance away from her best friend, she let her eyes drift from face to face. She landed on Casey first, still standing alienated beneath the live oak several yards away. Abandoning that vision, Maura scanned the rest of the crowd. Her eyes came to rest on a very familiar but unexpected face.

Rondo. He, like Casey, stood several yards away, observing the proceedings from afar.

_He must have heard news of Frost's death from out on the streets, _she mused.

She immediately whipped around to see if Jane had noticed him and to gauge her reaction. Jane had clearly not seen him. She was speaking in an undertone to Frost's mother, some distance away from Maura.

"You catch whoever did this, Detective," the woman demanded in a choked voice.

"I will do everything – _everything _– I can to find him and make him pay. I promise you," Maura could just make out Jane replying with quiet intensity. Her eyes flitted to meet Maura's but swiftly darted away. Frustrated, Maura looked back at Rondo. He met her eyes, glanced to Jane, and then returned his gaze to Maura. Then he looked to the coffin and back to Maura. Realization seemed to dawn in his dark face then, and he reached up and pulled off the knit cap he always wore and clutched it tightly before him. His usual boisterous charisma was completely deflated, and he cast one more sheepish, almost longing glance in Jane's before turning on his heel and walking away.

"Rondo!" Jane cried in a soft, broken voice, making him turn back. She'd seen him.

Maura ducked her head and stepped quietly aside as Jane brushed past her to greet her sometimes-C.I.

"Rondo," Jane said again as she drew near to him.

"Hey, Vanilla," he murmured in reply. Maura heard Jane choke back a sob at the nickname she'd always pretended to loathe. "I heard…I heard all about it. On the street. What happened."

Jane nodded, unable to speak above a whisper. "I thought you might."

He pinched and pulled at the cap in his hands. "I'm always listenin' out for you, Vanilla. And I…I'm sorry. We all liked Detective Frost. And he was your partner, so I know…"

Jane nodded again, tears spilling once more. From her vantage point, Maura ached to wipe them away. Jane dashed her wrist across her cheeks and beneath her nose. "Thank you for coming, Rondo." She put her hand on his arm. "Really. Thank you."

He nodded, reaching one finger up to barely brush her zygomatic bone, then stepped away. He turned abruptly to look Maura in the eye. He pointed at her. "You take good care of my Vanilla, Doctor Isles, hear?" Then he walked off before she could do more than nod. There was no room for debate with an edict like that.

Maura ducked her head again to avoid Jane's probing stare now directed at her. "I will," Maura whispered to herself. "Because God knows she won't take care of herself like she should."

Casey approached then, already reaching for Jane. "Let me take you home," he said softly.

She gave no indication that she'd heard him, staring blankly at the place Rondo had vacated.

"Jane, please. You really should rest." His pleading tone reminded Maura oddly of herself. She often took this tack with Jane when her friend struggled through difficult times.

When she came to the present, Jane patently refused to comply with her husband's urging. "No Casey," she said softly. "I think I'm going to go to work."

He released her, ceasing his gentle tugging on her arm. But he remained standing resolutely in place, looking her directly in the eye. "In your uniform?"

Jane looked down at herself as if realizing for the first time what she was wearing. "I brought a change of clothes. They're in the trunk." Her voice was quiet, toneless, matter-of-fact. The sound of it worried Maura far more than the broken whisper with which she had addressed Rondo.

Casey mashed his lips together, jaw clenched. "Then can I at least drive you to work?" he ground out.

"You can take my car back. I'll just get my clothes out and," she turned suddenly to Maura, "Maura, may I carpool to the precinct with you?" It was a testament to the lingering awkwardness from last night that she felt it necessary to expressly ask Maura's permission to ride with her.

Upon a brief but thorough examination of her own feelings, Maura found she harbored no resentment for Jane as a result of last night's drunken debacle. Nevertheless, she panicked. She wanted – she considered it a privilege – to help in any way that Jane would allow, to be there for Jane the way Jane had always been there for her. Yet, their kiss last night had served to heighten the intensity of Maura's already strong feelings for Jane, and as emotionally vulnerable as they both currently were, she feared being so near the detective now.

Her hands came together at her waist, fingers intertwining. She nodded meekly. "Yes of course."

The look of immense relief and gratitude on Jane's face struck a pang in Maura's heart.

"Jane," Casey interjected. "I can't let you do this. You're exhausted; I don't think you're ready to go back. You know, it's okay to take some time, stay home, let yourself grieve. You have the opportunity. Take it. But don't push yourself over the brink."

She rounded on him sharply, a small glint of her old fire returning to her eyes. "You think I'm not letting myself grieve?" she demanded. Her voice cracked precariously, but she kept on, softening only slightly at the look of surprise on his face. "Casey, I know you mean well, but I'm the only one who can decide how I handle…," she gestured vaguely to their surroundings, "all this." Then her voice once again dropped drastically in volume, its usual rich husk reduced to rasping whisper. "You have to let me do some things my way, okay? Just…" She trailed off, clearly unable to finish. She turned away, shaking her head, and practically fled to her car to retrieve her work clothes.

Casey dropped his hands to his sides with a sigh. "She won't let me help her," he murmured to no one in particular, but then his eyes found Maura, still standing some distance away. He seemed to plead with her with his gaze, asking nonverbally for any clue as to where he'd gone wrong. Maura, for her part, managed to convey sympathy in her returned glance, proffering a slight shrug that said, _She's stubborn. It's not all you._

He hesitated a moment, but then approached Maura. "How are you, Doctor Isles?"

She had to be honest. "I'm just trying to process like everyone else." She debated a moment on whether to comment further and what to say, finally settling on, "Grief changes people. And it takes time to heal." _The human body is remarkably elastic. It possesses an incredible natural ability to heal itself of almost any ailment or injury. The human psyche, on the other hand, is something of a paradox. It, too, is resilient, but also exceptionally_ _fragile. Compared to the capabilities of the physical body, the psyche – that is to say, the mind and emotions; what some say comprises the 'soul' – is not nearly so robust._

"Frost was a good guy," Casey acknowledged. He looked off in the general direction that Jane had retreated. "I don't understand her, Maura." He sounded as though he was just reaching this conclusion now. "I love her, but I don't…get her."

"She is very complex," Maura agreed, feeling relatively safe in the reply. _And no, _she thought. _You clearly do not understand her. _

Seeing he would find no greater sympathy or explanation with the medical examiner, Casey saw his way clear to make an exit. "I should go." His steps faltered a moment, then he turned to face her once more. "You're always there for her. You always have been. And I…haven't." He sighed through his nose, clearly frustrated. "I guess I should thank you. For…keeping her in one piece, I suppose. While I was away. So…thank you, Maura."

She managed a weak smile. "It is always my pleasure to be there for her when she needs it." _Though I didn't do it for you. _Banishing further unkind thoughts, she headed for her Prius.

Jane met her halfway, looking even more drained than she had at the beginning of the service. "Maura, I…I'm sorry," she said, her voice breaking for the umpteenth time that day. She swiped away a tear, took a deep breath and huffed it out. "I'm not going to bullshit you with excuses. I know what I did, I knew what I was doing when I did it." She bit her lip. "I wanted it." She met Maura's eyes then darted her gaze away. Swallowed. "You're the easiest person ever for me to talk to, but there's times like right now where it's so…damn…hard to say what's actually going on with me. I can't tell you all the things I feel." She crossed her arms, clutching her own elbows. "I'm bad with words and I've…I've got a lot on my plate. Up there." She pointed to her head, then dropped her hand to pinch the bridge of her nose. She sighed as fresh tears leaked out of eyes now squeezed tightly shut. "I've just gotta figure some things out."

Searching her best friend's face, Maura felt her heart and mind stutter out of sync. She was so afraid to reach out and touch Jane, yet she wanted nothing more. Her fingers caught Jane's left hand as it fell from her face, capturing and cradling it in both of her own. She glided her palm over sharply protruding knuckles. Jane's eyes slowly opened, liquid brown meeting with green and gold in a neutral place of quiet peace.

"I'm so sorry, Maura," Jane whispered. "I can't say it enough. I just hope you can forgive me somewhere down the road."

Maura shook her head, at last finding the words. "There's nothing to forgive." She touched Jane's cheek for the briefest breath of a moment, fingertips brushing feather-light against temple and jaw. Jane was trembling almost imperceptibly, but in that moment Maura felt it. _She's too weak even to push, _she thought, wary of Jane's eventual efforts to drive away anyone who would get close to her when she was this wounded.

Grounded, Jane gave one last slow sigh and stood up a little straighter. She hurriedly brushed the last of her tears from her face and made for Maura's car. "C'mon. Let's bring this bastard down."


	19. Chapter 19

A/N: The reviews on this story have been so unexpectedly spectacular! I cannot express enough how much I appreciate the support. On this site I've received some of the highest quality feedback a writer can hope for, and the feedback demonstrates that I have readers who are invested in the story, which is the strongest motivator for me. So please, don't stop! Keep reading, keep loving our ladies for who they are and letting them do their thing. And please keep writing in to let me know what you think! I love to hear from you. I truly do.

I'm sorry it has taken me so long to get this chapter to you, but life has been a hectic mess - and not all bad - lately, and finding time to sit down and hash things out on my computer keys has been a challenge. But I finally made some time and ended up cranking out a bunch more work than I anticipated, so I've got a couple of chapters headed your way very soon! Yay for back-to-back updates! Anyway, your patience with my sporadic updating is saintly and much appreciated by yours truly. Enjoy!

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"Any hits on that BOLO?" Jane strode into the bullpen with a file folder hanging loosely from her hand, and coffee clutched in the other. The air conditioning system groaned through the vents as it kicked on for the first time that morning. Fans buzzed on desks, and as she passed Korsak's work space, air from the two fans he had standing guard against the unyielding humidity lifted raven waves from her shoulders. For a moment, she looked almost like her old, fiery self.

She reached her own desk, daring only a cursory glance at the neighboring desk where her partner used to be. She perched herself on the edge of her chair and leveled her dark gaze at the sergeant.

Korsak returned her stare with an even gaze of his own. "Jane, you've been asking every day for three whole weeks whether we've gotten hits and the answer is _always_ –"

"– no." She sighed. "I know." She rubbed her forehead.

"I talked to Martinez and Frankie earlier," he offered. "They said that, from what they've gathered about this group, the guy we're looking for –,"

"– who killed three of our best and promptly slipped through our fingers?" Jane interjected hotly.

Korsak nodded. "One and the same. Get this – they're telling me he was a CI."

Jane slumped back in her desk chair. Crestfallen. "But they've said before that with known ties to local gangs and the cartels trying to make an in here, he's in our system, right? He shouldn't be that hard to find."

"To find, not really, no. But to make a move? Jane, Martinez said these cartels have been working the entire eastern seaboard for months now, apparently in efforts to traffic more drugs across more state borders all up and down the east coast." Korsak shrugged, clearly feeling defeated himself. "He's likely found away north or south of here, and in either case –,"

"He's out of our jurisdiction. Damn it." She resisted the urge to try heaving her desk on its end. "But you can't blame a girl for hoping," she added gruffly, yanking open the top left drawer of her desk and pulling out a hair tie. She deftly swept her hair into a ponytail and shrugged out of her blazer. Summer in Boston left her feeling sticky and restless, but it was the one time of the year that she suffered minimal pain in her hands. The only time she felt any serious discomfort was whenever a storm cell moved in. She loved listening to thunder and rain when it came some evenings, but Maura had once explained that "significant changes in barometric pressures – such as precede the approach of a summer storm – often exacerbate the symptoms of arthritis patients," and were likely the cause of the twinges she'd feel in her hands on those rainy days in summer. The rest of the time her hands felt practically normal. The warmth agreed with them, whereas the cold did not. And for that small respite in the midst of her emotional ordeal, she was grateful.

_Wonder how she's doing, _Jane thought as she rubbed her palms together and logged in to her email. She hadn't really spoken to Maura in weeks. Not about anything that mattered. She kept their conversations succinct and limited to case-related topics. She told herself couldn't handle the probing stares and gentle touches that asked what Maura was afraid to ask with words.

But if Jane was honest with herself, she would concede that it was her own fear that kept her away. Maura's mere presence made her feel things that permeated even through her grief…

"Good morning, Jane."

Jane looked up from her email inbox to find Maura looking stunning but a little tired in a sky blue silk blouse, khaki pencil skirt and nude pumps. Her tone was forced, professional. It hurt, Jane had to admit, but it was easier to cope with than the softness and warmth in her voice that made Jane deeply conscious of how much pain she was in. Maura's ability to see past her façade made it impossible to deny how vulnerable she felt. Bare, exposed, weak. Jane was able to keep the true depths of her grief hidden from most, but not Maura. Never Maura. Maura knew the extent of her hurt.

Maura had power over her.

"Hi," Jane replied hoarsely.

Maura hesitated a moment, appearing to struggle with keeping up the pretense of businesslike cordiality. Then she stepped forward, dropping the Dr. Isles mask back over the flicker of concern and extending the clipboard she'd carried in on her arm. "The results came in for the tox screen you asked me to run. For the Felton case." Setting the clipboard on the edge of Jane's desk, Maura pointed to a figure on the chart. "You were right about the traces of oxycodone in the second victim's system."

Jane's eyes skimmed over the chart then darted back to Maura's face. Her expression was impassive, but the hazel eyes couldn't quite resist begging Jane to speak, to open up.

For a moment, the detective was tempted. Exhaustion made her want so badly to give in.

_You give in now, you lose your momentum, _she thought. _You lose momentum, and you'll never get going again. Forward movement is the only thing keeping you alive. You have to keep moving for Frost._

"'Kay, thanks. I'll take a closer look."

Maura looked confused for a moment. Jane despised her own ability to catch all those in-between moments where Maura let the mask slip. It made it that much harder to keep her own mask in place. But just as quickly as it fell, the pretense was restored. She gave a stiff nod and turned on her heel.

As soon as Maura was out of the bullpen, Jane caught Korsak staring at her. "What did I do?"

Korsak scrambled for a quick answer. "It's just…have you two really spoken since the funeral?"

"Yes," Jane said, indignation sharpening her voice in spite of herself.

Korsak cocked a skeptical grey brow. "About anything other than cases."

"Ye –," Jane realized there was no pulling one over on Korsak. She sighed and passed her hand roughly over her face. "No."

"I hate to pry but, did something happen between you and Maura?"

"No, not really. Not exactly. It's…complicated." She huffed out another sigh. "It's not just her. I haven't really talked much…to anyone."

"Your mother?"

Jane shook her head, slowly sliding her face down into her palms. Hiding.

"Frankie?"

"Nope." She slumped a little further in her desk chair.

Korsak hesitated, probably unsure whether he wanted to hear her response to the next name. "Casey?" He winced.

Her voice was muffled. "God…no. I kept telling him I needed space and he finally took me literally. He's been," she grimaced as she looked up at Korsak, ashamed of her inability to maintain healthy relationships, "He's staying at a hotel. We haven't really spoken."

"Jesus, Jane. How long?"

"Couple weeks?" she offered weakly. "Wasn't long after the funeral." She propped her chin wearily on a fist. "I'm just…we're all dealing with a lot of shit. And…I don't even know anymore." She buried her face in her hands.

"Jane."

"Mmph."

"Jane, look at me."

She begrudgingly lifted her head.

"I know it's hard. I know you'd rather not talk about it because it hurts." He shrugged. "I get it. I do. But you can't keep shutting people out. It's not healthy."

"Do you know how many times I've heard that already?" she growled. "You sound like Maura." Exasperated with his look of concern, she rolled her eyes. "I _can't _talk about it, Korsak, because I wasn't _there._ I wasn't there, Vince! I wasn't there for Frost, for any of you. And then to show up in the aftermath and try to help pick up the pieces…I sometimes feel like I've got no business here." She flung her arm out in an emphatic gesture. "I was off enjoying myself, being _a newlywed _while the shit was hitting the fan here."

"You had no way of knowing."

"But that's just it! I _should _have known!" She shook her head, swallowing hard, but remaining dry-eyed. "I just feel like I should've known. And I should have been here. "

Korsak's phone rang. "Sergeant Korsak," he answered reluctantly, eyes still on Jane. He nodded at whatever the person on the other end was saying. "Understood. We'll head out now." Hanging up, he gave Jane a grim look. "Sorry, but we've got a body. Beacon Hill."

Jane shoved to her feet and froze. _Maura's neighborhood._ She grabbed her blazer off the back of her chair and shrugged it on, long strides carrying her out the door just ahead of Korsak.


	20. Chapter 20

A/N: Yay for back-to-back updates! I feel so accomplished! Hope you like. ;) This one's a little longish.

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"What do we have?" Jane demanded of the nearest uniform as she stepped out of the sedan with Korsak in tow.

"Elderly lady that lives in this house here," he pointed to a trim little house just down the street, now encircled in yellow crime scene tape, "was adding a couple little trees to her backyard. Guess she dug deep enough to find a prize. Says her shovel hit something that looked like plaid. Dug a little deeper and found a guy buried. She's got no clue who he is or who put him there. Her son's with her now."

She nodded. "Thanks." Ducking under the yellow tape, she turned to Korsak. "Gotta make sure we talk to her before we leave. Preferably alone."

"Agreed."

They skirted the house, passing the CSU van as they made for the gate leading to the back yard. Maura was already standing over the unearthed body – still in its shallow grave – pulling on gloves. She'd forgone her heels from this morning and donned a pair of bright yellow Wellington boots, strikingly similar to those Jane had loaned her for the beach floater case about a year ago. _God, why'd it have to happen in her neck of the woods? On top of everything else, she doesn't deserve to deal with this._ Maura made fleeting eye contact with Jane before launching into her typical diatribe of initial observations. "Judging by the condition of the flesh due to invertebrate consumption, I would estimate time of burial…"

Only half-listening, Jane slipped into auto-pilot and crouched down to take a careful look at the body for herself. It was hard to gauge because the guy had been worm-food for a little while now, but he looked to be in his mid-twenties, and in fairly good shape – aside from being very, very dead. She looked closer. In the breast pocket of what appeared to be a plaid flannel shirt, a little edge of something white seemed to be peeking out. She pulled out a pair of gloves that she'd stashed in her blazer pocket and snapped them on.

"What do you see, Jane?" Korsak said.

"He's got something in his breast pocket. Might be a phone number?" Jane reached into the hole and pulled at the white thing. It was a folded piece of paper. When she opened it, a flattened white flower fell out.

Korsak retrieved it and handed it to Jane, who snagged a fold of Maura's blazer sleeve between her fingers. Maura obeyed the silent gesture and leaned closer, inspecting the flower. "It appears to be a pressed lily," she concluded.

"Lily," Jane repeated thoughtfully.

"Yes," Maura said, gently taking the lily from Jane's hand. "A white stargazer lily, to be exact. _Lilium archelirion_. The white stargazer is often associated with expressions of sympathy in Western culture."

Korsak grunted. "Think the killer knew that?"

Maura shook her head, straightening. "Much too early to even begin to speculate why the flower was even there, let alone the killer's knowledge of the plant's significance." She looked to Jane, who had returned to her crouched position at the edge of the impromptu garden grave. "It is an interesting coincidence, though." She returned the flower to Korsak, turned and strode over toward the house, presumably to talk to some CSU staff about transporting the body.

"Coincidence, sure," Jane muttered to no one in particular. "There's something written on the paper, too," she said, unfolding it again. "'No harm, no foul.' The hell is that supposed to mean?"

She mentally faltered a moment when Maura failed to respond with a literal answer to her rhetorical question. Then she remembered Maura had stepped away to delegate. She sighed, looking from the paper to the body and back again. Finally she gave up. There was nothing more to be seen here, that she could tell. She reached back without looking, extending the paper behind her. "Frost, take the note and the flower to CSU for –," her voice choked off as she realized her error, her whole body going rigid with tension. She angled her head slightly, afraid to make eye contact with either of her colleagues, but detecting no movement out of her peripheral vision. "_Shit,_" she whispered brokenly, and stood up. Brushing absently at her slacks, she turned and pushed past Korsak, wrist pressed beneath her nose in a vain effort to conceal her growing distress. She barely saw Maura through the tears blurring her vision as she passed her.

* * *

But Maura saw her.

Glancing from Jane's retreating form back to Korsak standing bewildered beside the flower bed, Maura excused herself from the discussion with CSU staff and made a beeline through the investigative bustle toward the sergeant.

"What's wrong with Jane? What did you say to her?" she demanded, feeling a sudden rise of righteous anger.

Korsak backed a step and held up his hands. "I didn't say a thing. She started to ask for Frost, I think, and then realized…anyway, it was hard for me to hear her, and she took off before I could ask."

Taking in his defensive posture, Maura relaxed. She realized in that moment how naturally protective she felt of Jane when her best friend was hurting. She didn't feel it often because Jane so rarely allowed herself to be vulnerable, but there had been some key points in their history together that the usual roles of protector and protected reversed. In those watershed moments, Maura felt it not only her duty, but her honor to stand sentinel over the remarkably tender heart that Jane normally kept so carefully ensconced in toughness and bravado. In those moments, she found it startlingly easy to cast aside her usual meekness and civility.

"I'm sorry, Sergeant."

"I get it, Maura. You care about her a lot. We all do."

Maura nodded, feeling her throat constrict slightly. "I'll go talk to her."

He offered a small smile. "Good idea."

She found Jane leaning against the side of the house on the other side of the gate, next to the green waste dumpster. Out of sight. Her forearm was pressed against the wall and she had her forehead leaned against it. The other hand was cupped over her mouth, evidently attempting to stifle any sobs that might escape. Jane was typically hypervigilant at a crime scene; it was impossible to sneak up on her on an average day in the field. But now, without making a particular effort to be stealthy, Maura was able to draw quite close to her friend without Jane appearing to take notice.

Curious, and frankly desperate to mend the breach of coldness and hurt between them, Maura reached out.

Jane jumped when tentative fingertips made contact with her shoulder. But still she didn't look up. She stood right where she was, shaking silently.

Alarmed that Jane was making no effort to pull herself together – like she usually did on the rare occasions when Maura discovered her weeping – Maura dared to edge closer, sliding her hand slowly across her friend's back.

"It's habit," Jane choked out finally, knocking her fist against the siding. "I say his name out of sheer _habit._" The crying started to wrack her entire body, and her knees began to buckle.

Jane had a track record of refusing offers of physical comfort and reassurance in the past week or so. She had so steadfastly denied her need or want for even the slightest touch of physical affection, that Maura had withdrawn from her – more so than she ever had in the past. The withdrawal had proven surprisingly difficult. But rather than endure the repeated rejection of even her platonic advances to support her best friend, Maura made the challenging decision to give Jane the space she thought she needed. She did it as much out of respect for Jane's apparently tenuous relationship with her husband as she did in accordance with her express wishes to be left primarily alone.

But this was too much to bear. Maura had done as best she could to stand back while Jane "figured things out," but at this point her aimless struggle was abundantly clear. Maura had to step in.

Exasperated, she murmured, "I can't just watch you struggle anymore." Catching Jane as she sank, she gingerly guided the detective to angle their bodies together. Too spent and stricken by unresolved grief to resist, the detective complied. Though they remained standing, Maura felt like she was cradling Jane in her arms. Her best friend felt lighter than Maura remembered, but she thought perhaps that was only because it had been weeks since she'd even touched Jane, let alone put her arms around her.

While Jane fought to get her breathing under control, Maura lifted her head and glanced back at the crime scene. Korsak passed near the gate and risked a look in their direction. He seemed to take everything in after only a second. He wore a vague question on his face, and Maura shook her head silently in reply. _It'll be a while before she's ready. _Korsak nodded his understanding and turned to take charge of processing and cleaning up what remained of the scene.

Reassured that they were again alone, Maura tightened her grip just slightly as Jane finally took some deeper breaths. Encouraging the flow of oxygen with her own example of calming breaths, Maura took the fleeting opportunity to take Jane in – scent and sensation. It had been too long since she'd enjoyed this unique privelege of physical closeness with Jane, and she didn't know when she'd have another opportunity. Their relationship - strained by grief more than a little repressed desire - remained tenuous.

Then one last shuddering sigh signaled that the detective was as ready as she'd ever be to face the rest of the day.

"I'm screwing up, Maura," Jane admitted quietly as she exhaled. "I feel like I'm getting everything wrong, but I don't know which way is up anymore."

Maura pulled back, but didn't release her completely. In that moment, it felt safe to gently take Jane's face in both her hands and hold her gaze for a moment. "That's perfectly normal."

"It doesn't feel normal. Nothing feels normal."

Maura nodded. "No. And it won't for a while. That's what grief does." She dropped her hands to Jane's shoulders, gripping them firmly.

Jane looked away.

_It's not enough, _Maura thought. _She's not buying it. You're not helping. Say more._

"But Jane," she said, lifting her best friend's chin with the tips of her fingers, "You're not helping yourself, or the people that love you, by trying to keep it to yourself. There is no such thing as not feeling. There is only postponing the inevitable, and the longer you put it off, the more it is going to hurt coming out." She felt tears sting her own eyes at this last sentence. She had no idea where the boldness to say these things was coming from.

Jane nodded her understanding, then shook her head. "It's not that easy. You make it sound easy and it's not."

"I know it's not. Trust me. I know. But…will you at least try?"

Jane just looked at her.

"I'm not asking you to wear your heart on your sleeve all the time, around everyone. But sometimes, when its hardest to bear on your own, will you trust me, trust your family, to help you?"

Her friend's jaw clenched as she waged war internally. She lowered her head.

"That's all we want, Jane." Maura bit her lip, looked down at her bright yellow Wellingtons before looking back up at the heartbreakingly beautiful woman in front of her. "That's all I want."


	21. Chapter 21

A/N: Thanks to Fenway03 and a couple of you other sweethearts out there, I've been poked and prodded and nagged to write more - and SOON - so here is another chapter! One or two more should be up by the end of the evening. But for now, thanks for reading, thanks for bugging, and please enjoy!

* * *

Jane nodded. It made sense in her heart. Perfect sense. That was one of the multitude of reasons why she loved Maura. Bitter emotions and difficult concepts were typically easier to swallow when Maura presented them. Because her best friend appealed to her logic and her emotions simultaneously.

_She's perfect for you. But you don't deserve her._

"Okay," was all she could manage to get out.

Clearly dissatisfied with the reply, but willing to roll with it, Maura let her go. "Okay?"

"Okay…I'll try," she rasped. "No guarantees." Guilt began to swirl in her stomach and she slowly backed away. _You don't deserve her. _"Gotta get back to work," she said weakly.

Maura nodded, eyes intent on her. Not so much waiting for her to slip up as much as just…ready to catch her if she did. "Alright…if you're ready." She looked and sounded doubtful. After all, she had just watched her friend fall completely apart right in front of her.

Jane shook her head as she pushed through the gate and took one last look at what was left of the crime scene. She felt a fleeting moment of pride at the short work Korsak and the team had made of it all.

"Pretty much everything's bagged up and ready to go if you'd like to start heading back to the precinct now," Korsak announced, coming from inside the house. He held up the notepad he always kept in the inside breast pocket of his sports jacket. "Statements all taken. Managed to get the lady alone for a few minutes to get her take on everything. It's pretty much like the uniform said. Unless…you'd like to go in and talk to her yourself?"

Jane shook her head. "No, I trust you. We can always come back if we need anything else. Let's get out of here."

Korsak shrugged. "Works for me."

They passed Frankie in the hall leading back to the bullpen. Jane caught his arm and pulled him aside.

"Janie, are you okay? You…don't look so hot." He peered into her face, no doubt noting the puffy redness of her eyes.

"Allergies. I'm fine."

Frankie's facial expression said that he wanted to call bullshit, but Jane could also read the empathy there. Neither of them were remotely "over" losing Frost. "'Kay. Hey, Ma says you kicked Casey out? What happened?"

Jane groaned loudly, but when she spoke she kept her voice down to a harsh, vehement whisper. "Why does she always assume it's _my _fault when my relationships – never mind. No, Frankie, I didn't kick him out. He left. He's staying in a hotel."

He frowned a cocked his head. "Jane."

"Look, it's a long-ass story that I don't feel like rehashing now. Maybe I'll fill you in on details later. In the meantime, you can tell Ma to mind her own goddamn business."

Her brother crossed his arms across his chest, but wisely refrained from questioning her further. "So what'd you stop me out here for?"

"I was just thinking, you're with the drug unit, so it's very possible you'll get word on that BOLO before any of us do. Just wanted to ask a favor, that if –,"

"– that if I hear anything about our guy being back in town, you want to know about it." He took her by the shoulders when she slumped in visible relief. "I got your six, Jane. I'll keep you posted as much as I can."

"Thanks, Frankie." She squeezed his forearms before he let her go. She normally wasn't very demonstrative with him at work, but given everything they'd been going through recently, she felt compelled to express a little more than usual. She reached up and kissed his cheek, murmuring, "I love you, little brother."

He nodded. "I know. Love you, too, Janie. But you should talk to Ma. She's…a little scared for you, Janie. And…I know I'm going out on a limb, here, but maybe you should talk to Casey?"

She gave him a dangerous look, but felt tears threaten to undermine her fragile composure.

"Just don't keep stuffing it in. Air it out."

She nodded tentatively, then turned on her heel. There was paperwork and research to be done. Results on that BOLO were still pending, but now she finally had a fresh open case to occupy her time while she waited to bring down Frost's murderer.

* * *

Maura was elbow-deep in the flowerbed corpse's innards when Jane elbowed her way through the swinging doors and greeted Maura with a cursory, "Hey."

"Hey, yourself," came Maura's bemused reply. Jane hadn't been to visit her in the morgue in quite some time. It was a pleasant surprise to finally see her down there again. Tilting her head to one side, she said, "What are you –?"

"Do you want to go to lunch?" Jane blurted. She instantly joined her hands together and began to press and rub her scarred palms. "It's just, I…think I finally feel like eating. A little. Maybe."

Maura set down the bone saw and assessed Jane. Her scrutiny made Jane feel like she was on the other side of the interrogation room. She looked down at herself. Stress and high emotion wore her down and ruined her appetite. She'd lost weight; she knew her face must be drawn, shadowed, and pale from lack of quality sleep.

The flicker of hope in Maura's face nearly demolished what was left of the walls Jane had erected around her vulnerable emotions. She could practically hear her best friend's thoughts.

_Is this it? Has she finally turned a corner? Are things looking up for Jane?_

"I can take a break now. Did you have a place in mind?" She began stripping the gloves from her hands.

"I said I felt like maybe eating. Didn't say I was ready to make important life decisions, Maura," Jane rejoined with a dry chuckle.

Maura felt an overwhelming urge to hug her. She stepped around the autopsy table to act on the impulse, but stopped herself short. _Don't push it, Maura, _she told herself. "You're joking." An observation.

Jane looked taken aback by Maura's grin. "Um…yes. Yes, I am. Is that…okay?"

Maura affectionately touched her arm. "It's perfectly fine. Refreshing, actually." She added a chuckle of her own. "I like to see you being more yourself again."

The detective reflexively rubbed her upper arm where Maura's fingers had brushed her skin. "Yeah, well…don't get used to it just yet." A reminder that Jane was still a long way from feeling good again.

Maura's comment had coaxed forth a self-conscious, bashful smile from the detective, and Maura's grin broadened in reply. She felt the return of a warmth that had been absent from her life for too many weeks. "How about we keep it simple. Robber?" She wanted to choose something that would appeal to Jane's minimal appetite. Metabolically, Jane's manner of coping with stress created a vicious cycle. Highly emotional situations hit her so much harder when she didn't nourish herself properly. But in the heat of such moments, Jane often lost all interest in food, making it that much more difficult for herself to pull through.

Jane shrugged, but the smile remained, and Maura rejoiced inwardly. "Works for me."


	22. Chapter 22

"How are _you _feeling lately?" Jane asked as they stepped out of the Boston summer heat and into the artificially moderated temperatures of the Dirty Robber. "I mean, on top of everything else, this latest homicide is kinda in your neighborhood."

Maura nodded. "The thought had occurred to me. But I try not to dwell on it. An astonishing amount of crime happens each year in this city – and statistically, criminal activity increases in frequency during the summer…"

"Murder is definitely a fair-weather sport," Jane quipped.

Maura barely suppressed a smile. "Essentially, yes. But I don't let it deter me from living here. Besides, it's my job to help solve these crimes as efficiently and effectively as possible."

Jane couldn't help but notice that Maura hadn't exactly answered her question. "Well, if you ever have the least bit of concern about your safety…," she said as they sat down, "there's always my place."

Maura's head came up abruptly. "Thank you, but I think I'll be okay."

Jane saw, then, the discomfiture in Maura's face that she was trying to conceal. And she remembered the boundaries that had sprung up between and around them since Jane had gotten married. With Maura, it was so easy to forget that she technically shared her living space with her husband, though for now he was keeping his distance. The undeniably dynamic chemistry between herself and Maura remained a constant in both of their lives.

But the comfortable intimacy they had shared was no longer the norm.

Jane was stunned to realize then that she missed it. She missed Maura. Her best friend was right in front of her, and yet she missed her. She realized that she had wanted very much for Maura to admit she was a little nervous about a body turning up in Beacon Hill. She wanted that - she would gladly use her protective instinct as an excuse to have Maura close again. As close as before.

A faint, dull, ache settled in her heart then. _You screwed up, _she thought. _You picked the wrong person._ A leaden weight plummeted to the bottom of her stomach.

"Your mother has been asking me about you," Maura announced without preamble as the server brought their glasses of water and a basket of fries.

"Really?" Jane groaned, exasperation snapping her consciousness back to the present. "When will that woman learn to drop a thing?"

"Jane, she is a concerned mother. She…said that you and Casey…weren't speaking much."

"What, did she tell you to say that? Did she put you up to this?" Jane jabbed a sweet potato fry at Maura.

"No, she did not," Maura's voice remained level, her demeanor calm. Discarding any hesitation, she seized Jane's hand across the table. "Jane…look at me. I told you before, and nothing's changed: you are my business. And yes, I worry about you sometimes. Because I love you. That's why your mother nags, why Frankie teases, why Korsak asks you questions you sometimes don't want to answer."

"Maura…" Jane swiped angrily at her eyes with her free hand. She couldn't help herself from gripping Maura's just a little tighter. She wasn't even entirely sure why she did.

"But what I was going to say was that _if _you ever want to talk about any of this, I will listen. No judgment." Maura's thumb passed over the scar on the back of Jane's hand. "Whenever – if ever – you decide you're ready to open up, I will be your sounding board." She held Jane's hand and her gaze for a beat longer, then released her and sat back in her chair.

Jane took a breath. "I just –"

Maura's cell chimed. She clenched her jaw, trying to maintain an outward calm, despite her frustration at the timing of the call. Apologizing, she pulled her phone out to check the screen. She turned it for Jane to see. "It's your mother."

Jane rolled her eyes but gestured for Maura to answer it.

"Hello, Angela."

Jane could hear her mother's voice from across the table, squawking out the tiny speaker. _"Is Jane with you?"_

"Y-yes, she is…why? Do you need to speak to her?"

_"Tell her…"_

Upon hearing those words from her mother's lips, Jane extended her hand, indicating that Maura was to hand over the phone. Maura covered the receiver end with her fingertips and mouthed, "Are you sure?"

Jane nodded vehemently and Maura relinquished the phone.

"Ma?" Jane interrupted her mother mid-tirade. "Ma, why are you calling Maura to talk to me?"

"Because I got tired of trying to chase you down and you won't answer your phone when I call you!"

Jane sighed. "We've been over this." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "I don't want to talk about it."

"How do you know you don't want to talk about what I want to talk about if you never _talk _to me?"

She looked up at Maura, who was watching her with trepidation. "I know because all you want to talk about is, is," she huffed out a sigh, "Casey or Frost and how I'm handling both situations really badly. _I get it, _Ma. But reminding me over and over again that I'm screwing everything up is – shockingly – not helping."

"Janie, that's where you're wrong."

Jane looked up to acknowledge the server delivering their food with a curt nod. She switched the phone to her right hand and raked the left one through her hair. "Then enlighten me," she groaned, propping her cheek on her fist.

"I'm not calling all the time to remind you of how you've failed. You've always had a knack for finding your own mistakes and beating yourself up over them until the cows come home."

She stabbed her fork down into her salad. "Gee, thanks, Ma. Inspiring words."

"Jane, listen to me. I'm calling all the time because you need to talk about it. I know you do. And I know you think I'm not helping, but I wish you'd realize that all I want to do is help, and I can't know how best to do that unless you _talk to me._"

Jane looked up from her plate at Maura. Her best friend had clearly overheard Angela's words, and was nodding slightly in agreement. The right side of her face quirked up in an expression that said, "She makes a valid point."

She passed her hand over her face, conceding. "Alright, Ma. Okay. I hear you and understand what you're saying."

"Thank you, Janie."

Jane caught Maura's eye again. "I'm not ready yet, Ma. But soon, I think. Soon I'll be ready to talk about my feelings and address things. It's the seventh inning stretch, but I'm still working some stuff out in my head."

"I hope you're not neglecting your heart in all this." There was a maternal warning in her mother's voice.

Jane's breath caught. She could _feel _Maura watching her. "I – no. I'm…taking that into account, too."

"Good. Because they're equally as important."

She could feel her throat constricting. The sensation rarely seemed to leave her these days. "Alright, good talk. I'm at lunch, so I gotta wrap up. Bye, Ma."

"Bye, sweetie. I love you."

"Yep. Love you, too. Bye." She ended the call and handed the phone back to Maura. "Sorry."

Maura shook her head. "Don't apologize. That conversation needed to happen."

* * *

After stowing the last of her notes from the day's interviews and field trips to the morgue, Jane stood at her car with the key fob in her hand, thumb poised over the trunk latch button. It seemed a solid 2 minutes passed before she made up her mind, but she popped the trunk and pulled out her gym clothes. She found herself almost smiling as she imagined the glee on Maura's face. _I ate lunch voluntarily AND I feel like a little workout. _She knew her best friend would be over the moon about it. And the knowledge brought about a flutter in her abdomen and a flush of heat across the surface of her skin.

She almost texted Maura to invite her to an evening workout in the air-conditioned gym, but ultimately decided she needed to do this alone for now. She did some of her most lucid thinking when plying the kickboxing dummy with her fists or working up a sweat on the elliptical. And she had a lot of thinking to do.


	23. Chapter 23

A/N: Ugh, I know I'm taking too long between updates, and I'm sorry! Thanks to Fenway03 and others for taking me at my word and bugging me for updates - it's so sweet to know that you are all eagerly awaiting each new installment. Hope you like this one.

There's a little pun "Easter egg" or two in this long-ish chapter for those of you who like to point out that kind of stuff. I know I do. Puns are my favorite.

That's all for now...please enjoy!

* * *

Jane made short work of changing her charcoal grey pantsuit and mint green t-shirt for a workout tank top and running shorts. The hallway from the locker rooms to the main gym floor passed a room equipped with punching bags, martial arts dummies, thickly padded floors and walls, and even a small raised sparring ring. Jane ducked inside, grateful that there were no self-defense classes at this time of night. She made a beeline for the closet at the back of the room where she knew the gym's martial arts instructors kept spare pads and gloves for practice. She selected a pair of UFC-style fingerless gloves with reinforced padding around the knuckles. She shut the closet door behind her as she exited, and approached the nearest kickboxing dummy. She got to within an arm's length of it and froze before she could deliver the first blow.

_"Ugh, what!" she groaned in response to the sturdy, persistent knocking at her apartment door._

_"It's us, Jane," came Frost's voice from the other side of the door. _

_Jane sighed and gingerly pushed herself off the couch, wincing violently as the stitches in her abdomen pulled. She shuffled slowly to the door, turned the deadbolt, slid the chain aside, and cracked it open to peer out. "What's up?" she rasped. A frown creased her forehead as it became apparent that Frost and Korsak were struggling to conceal something dark and bulky behind their backs._

_"We brought you a little something," Korsak said._

_Frost smiled. "A…'get well' present."_

_"Guys, what-?"_

_Korsak pulled out the bulky object from behind their backs. Frost beamed. His smile seemed to light the doorway._

_"A boxing dummy?" Jane exclaimed, incredulous. She couldn't keep the amused smile from her face as she opened the door fully to accept the gift. The pain that knotted low in her side was temporarily forgotten._

_"We're not trying to encourage to do anything super physical too soon," Frost noted, "But it's something to look forward to while you recover."_

_Korsak grinned. "After all that couch rest, you'll have tons of pent-up energy to spend."_

_Jane smirked. "Yeah, and lots of frustration to take out if Ma keeps on hovering like she's doing." She looked at them both affectionately. "Thank you both." She held out her arms, embracing Korsak first, then Frost. They both returned the hug far more lightly than they would have normally, but Jane didn't mind. She knew they were simply loath to do anything that might exacerbate her slowly healing wound. As she pulled away, she couldn't help but ask, "How are things at the station? How's Maura?"_

Maura's name echoed in her mind as her memory-self focused her gaze on Frost, straining to maintain the clarity of the image for as long as possible before it faded. She felt as though she was zooming in on him, and her subconscious took a turn from the true memory of her partner to a vividly imagined replication of his death.

_The sharp report of a nine millimeter._

_Arterial spray marking the site as a place where catastrophe struck. Coloring it with the vivid hue of an abrupt and premature end._

_Sirens howling, emergency lights glaring, Prada heels on tile floor, rattling gurney wheels racing._

_Frost's head cradled in Maura's bloodied hands. Her eyes widening in horror as she realizes there is nothing she can do to stop it. Her face crumpling the moment his eyes fall shut. Her entire body quaking silently as he slips from her grasp._

Jane shook her head violently and struck the limbless synthetic torso in front of her as hard as she could. But her fist only made contact once. Undefined, raw emotion ripped her breath from her lungs and she sank to the padded floor, arms wrapped limply around the dummy. Tears spilled silently but profusely from her eyes as the stark reality of her partner's permanent absence collided with her heart in wave after wave. Oxygen seemed in short supply as she sat there, panting and motionless. She pulled her knees to her chest, retreating into herself.

Eventually the waves receded, and breathing became easier. _I'm so sick of this shit,_ she lamented as a broken whimper escaped her throat. She wanted Maura.

_"It's not that easy. You make it sound easy and it's not."_

_"I know it's not. Trust me, I know."_

Maura understood. Maura didn't judge.

Jane began to worry – not for the first time – that she relied too much on Maura to help her maintain emotional stability. Typically, that role was reserved for a spouse, not a friend. Even if that friend was truly the best friend anyone could hope for. But the spouse in her life was – emotionally, at least – nowhere to be found.

Disgusted with the maudlin wreck she had become, Jane swiped the back of her hand across her eyes. She shoved to her feet and – electing to run in place rather than whaling on a glorified mannequin – marched herself to the main gym floor, scoping out available treadmills and ellipticals. She casually made note of a few vaguely familiar faces; plenty of other cops and detectives shared her idea of getting a late workout before hitting the proverbial hay. Tears pricked the back of her eyes and her throat tightened painfully as she recalled how she used to always see Frost bench-pressing or doing sit-ups in the corner. She made a concerted effort to cast aside her melancholy. This was about getting healthy again.

_He would've wanted that._

She finally settled on a stationary bike that afforded her a decent view of the rest of the building, and hoped against hope that the mundane repetition of pedaling in place would combine with her fondness for people-watching to distract her from sadness. She tucked her feet securely into the stirruped pedals and set the resistance on the bike. As she pedaled, she gazed leisurely around herself, observing the workout routines of other gym-goers. As her eyes described a 180-degree arc around the room, they came to rest on the row of ellipticals to her right.

Her legs and feet faltered in their rotations as she focused in on the last person she'd anticipated seeing there, but also the one who had been foremost on her mind only moments ago.

Maura made purposeful strides on the elliptical. She wore headphones in her ears – fancy, expensive ones that wrapped around the outside cartilage and didn't reach too far into the ear so as to be less damaging to the eardrum. Or so she'd explained once. She appeared to be very engaged in whatever she was listening to. Her eyes were closed, her expression relaxed. There was an absence of tension in her body as she moved with steady strides. _Probably listening to some Rachmaninoff-Stradivarius van Something Concerto in F sharp major, Opus 28 thingy, _Jane thought with a smirk, though she wouldn't have put it past Maura to have found some literary magazine or even medical journal on a podcast, as absurd as it seemed.

But then Maura started bobbing her head rhythmically and even mouthing the occasional word. And she looked happy. Like she was enjoying this time by herself. Time where she didn't have to think or worry or be sad.

Jane envied her resilience. Here she was, struggling to shake this opaque shroud of despondency, and there Maura was, taking it all in stride, as it were.

But she also admired Maura. She was beautiful, her warm gold hair swept into a relaxed ponytail, her body trim and defined, but still soft and slightly curvy. Observing her recalled to mind her unique scent that Jane had come to easily recognize and appreciate – it was warm and clean and faintly sweet, like fresh laundry and…honey? Vanilla? Jasmine? Jane could never pinpoint that extra essence of something that made it so easy for her to pick out Maura's scent.

Jane realized she had stopped pedaling right around the time that Maura slowed to a stop on her own machine and took a glance around the room. Lifting a water bottle to her lips, the medical examiner perused her surroundings in much the same way as Jane had earlier. Catching herself staring, Jane wasn't sure how she should react once Maura saw her.

But when her best friend caught her eye and smiled, when her lips formed Jane's name, Jane marveled at the swiftness with which she felt herself responding. That unmistakable warmth flushing through the capillaries nearest the surface of her skin; the swooping sensation in her stomach like she had just leapt off a rooftop; the erratic, racing flutter in her heart that she felt all the way up into her throat.

She glanced stupidly at the wedding band on her left hand and thought, _The hell am I doing?_

"You're here!" Maura said as she stepped up to Jane's bike.

"What, you weren't expecting me?" Jane jibed, slouching back away from the handle bars and looking down at her friend.

A rare expression crossed her features and Jane couldn't quite read it. "Well, no, to be honest – I wasn't. But I'm glad to see you…here. It's an improvement."

"Yeah, I've been sorely lacking in the progress department lately," Jane groused as she dismounted from the bike and wiped the seat down. Seeing Maura look a little crestfallen at the possibility her words had been misinterpreted, Jane changed the subject. "How long have you been here? More importantly, how did you _get _here? I didn't see your car in the lot."

Maura shook her head. "You wouldn't have. I ran here." She grinned triumphantly.

Jane reeled for a moment as the woman beamed up at her. "Okay…seriously? You ran? How – how do you even…_do that?_"

Here came the endearing head tilt. "Do what?"

"That, that 'bounce-back' thing you do! I mean, I feel like I barely made it through today and I almost went straight to bed from the station – but here _you _are, running from there to here and then running some more once you've arrived – I guess I just don't understand." Her shoulders bunched with rising tension even as she slouched, and she could feel her stomach clenching. All these conflicting emotions – frustration, exasperation, depression, and not to mention her growing attraction to her best friend – were making her so uncomfortable in her own skin. And she didn't know what to do about it. So she wrapped it all up in anger out of pure force of habit.

"Jane, what are you trying to say?" Maura's forehead furrowed with deep misgivings and concern for her best friend. She seemed to lean back almost imperceptibly as she observed Jane's body language and interpreted the signs of rising anger.

Jane loathed herself for making Maura cringe like that. It broke her heart that Maura still instinctively shied from Jane's anger; to Jane, it meant that Maura still didn't feel one-hundred percent secure in her friendship status with Jane to where anger was no longer something to fear. Jane's goal had always been to quash that insecurity and replace it with the kind of love and affection that Jane had taken for granted growing up. She huffed out a sigh, her voice coming out low and strained. "I'm trying to say that I feel like I don't know how to handle anything anymore. I don't know how to react – normal, day-to-day routine stuff is so _hard _now…and then I get moments like this where," she gestured to Maura with an open palm, "I don't feel like we're even remotely on the same page emotionally and that…I don't know what to do with that. It's like…it's almost like you've forgotten already – or you've moved on – and I'm here wanting nothing more than to do the same," she dropped her voice further, "and not having a goddamn clue how to do that."

"Jane, I'm sorry you're frustrated…but I don't want you to mistake my pursuit of physical activity for…_forgetting_." Though her expression grew cold as a means of defense, there was the faintest quaver in Maura's voice now, betraying the effect Jane's words had on her composure. That Jane would even allude to the possibility of Maura forgetting their friend and colleague clearly struck the medical examiner to her core. "I _do _miss him still. If that's what you're getting at. I miss Frost terribly. It'll be a long time before I don't. And while you and I, we are…quite close…as friends, we are still individuals, Jane. You and I will always process certain emotions very differently from one another. If you want to sit and talk about it…"

"No, Maura, I just…don't…_dammit._" She swiped her wrist beneath her nose again as she felt tears threaten for the umpteenth time. "I don't want to _feel _anymore," she whispered in a harsh, broken accent, fleeing abruptly from a very exasperated, very worried Maura.


	24. Chapter 24

She stumbled into her apartment feeling equal parts run down and flustered out of her mind. It was exhausting to feel so many things so intensely all at the same time. She slapped the case file for the "garden variety corpse" – as she had come to think of it as – on the tiny breakfast bar and began to pace in tight, restrained circles. Joe Friday yipped as she bounded around the corner, and fell in line behind her pacing caretaker.

"Hey, Joe," Jane said to the dog. Joe seemed to pick up on the lackluster tone in Jane's voice, for her ears dropped and she stopped following Jane. Jane, for her part, was debating on whether to inundate her angst with alcohol or try to spend her last waking hours more productively by studying the evidence and statements that had already been collected.

She decided to compromise.

She stopped in front of her refrigerator and opened the small cabinet above it. Pulled out a bottle of whiskey that had been given to her by a high school friend – an acquaintance, really, whom she no longer had contact with – as a congratulatory gift the year she made detective. As Jane wasn't really one for hard liquor, the bottle had sat up there for years, collecting dust. Some detached part of her brain observed how intriguing it was that this particular set of circumstances had finally prompted her to bring it down and crack the wax seal.

She found a cheesy souvenir shot glass from Las Vegas buried in another cabinet. Poured herself the first shot and slid onto the barstool. She flipped open the case file.

They had come to find out that the victim, Shawn Felton, was the younger brother of the first victim of a previous pair of murders – a man by the name of Drew. Shawn had been a high school lit teacher, and reportedly well-liked by students and fellow faculty members. He had been the last person to student-teach under Mrs. Grace Kuziemski – the retired lady in whose garden Shawn's body had been buried. Mrs. Kuziemski had denied recognizing Shawn when first questioned, but later admitted – once they got her alone – that she had denied Shawn out of fear, and at her son's urging.

"Still miffed about that," Jane growled to herself. She flipped a page.

Shawn's older brother Drew had been found dead about a week prior in a gas station bathroom. Maura conducted toxicology screens and found traces of oxycodone, ketamine, and other illicit drugs in his system. At first it appeared that he had overdosed. Their efforts to dig into Drew's background had revealed his drawn-out struggle with various addictions; he was in and out of rehab his entire adult life.

"Black sheep," Jane muttered as she knocked back the shot of whiskey with a grimace and flipped another page. The whiskey burned fiercely all the way down, but gave her a harsh, perceptual clarity that she felt she'd been lacking before.

Drew had been estranged from most of his family. In general, the Feltons appeared well-to-do, classically middle-class. Shawn was the good kid, Drew the tortured soul. Jane could only imagine what the family dynamic was like behind closed doors. What it was like for Drew, who Maura suggested might have been self-medicating to cope with some manifestation of mental illness.

_Maura's probably mad at you._ Jane shook her head and rolled her shoulders.

But Maura's closer inspection of his body during autopsy had drawn her attention to a number of recent contusions and other signs of struggle. He hadn't been alone, nor had he drugged himself willingly. Jane had suspected his history of substance abuse had been used by the killer as a cover. She also figured that whoever killed him was connected to him through drugs, perhaps as a dealer or a trafficker.

_You hurt her feelings._

Shawn was the only member of the family that had kept any sort of contact with Drew.

And Shawn also had traces of oxycodone in his system. It was mixed with other drugs to form a deadly cocktail.

Jane poured herself another shot. At this juncture it was clear that the two homicides, despite initially appearing completely independent of each other, were related. She wondered, with the drug connection, if they were somehow linked to the courier who had killed Frost. It was a far-fetched idea, but still worth exploring.

She swallowed the second shot and immediately poured a third. Every thought she had somehow led back to Frost.

_You're always screwing things up. Focus. Focus. Concentrate. Stop wallowing. Enough is enough._

_Fix it._

She jumped slightly at the sound of a key turning in the deadbolt of her apartment door. She tossed back the third hit of whiskey. "Maura, I'm done talking tonight. I'm tired. Can we not do this…?"

"Jane? Jane, can you undo this chain for me?"

"Casey? What –?" She was genuinely shocked to see her husband's face trying to peer between the door and it's frame.

"Please just let me in."

She rose a little unsteadily and strode over to slide the chain free of its slot. She held the door open just wide enough for him to enter sideways, and shut it immediately behind him. He walked into the kitchen, seeming wary of his surroundings. He took in the bottle of whiskey, the shot glass, and the open case file at a glance.

The look of reaction on his face made Jane feel defensive. She tensed, standing awkwardly beside the bottle on the breakfast bar. "You're here – what brought you back?"

"I needed to see my wife. She's been drowning herself in work lately, and won't make time for me." He looked again at the items strewn across the breakfast bar. "Jane, what are you doing?"

"Homework. We've got a case."

He took in the kitchen and living area with his eyes. "I see. Can't imagine you do your best work with a shot of Rough Stock Black Label in your hand. What's really going on, Jane? This isn't like you."

"I don't see how that's any of your business." She crossed her arms tightly over her chest.

"I just," he shrugged and dropped his arms in resignation. "I know losing a partner was hard on you, but I just feel like, maybe – I guess I just thought I'd see you on the mend by now."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Are you actually trying to apply an agenda to my _grieving process?_ Casey, I'm not some military operation where you time out exactly what I feel and when I feel it and where I deal with it. You're treating your relationship with me like some Army thing you signed up for. And I don't appreciate it."

Casey looked taken aback. "This _really _isn't like you."

"Oh, you know what also isn't like me?" Jane demanded. "Making a lifelong commitment to someone who already has a history of walking out on me when he couldn't have his relationship with me _exactly _the way he wanted. It's like as soon as things get rough, you back out." She sighed and poured herself another sloppy shot, but didn't drink it back right away. Her husband looked like he wanted to take it away from her, like a parent might want to take scissors from a small child. "We thought we loved each other. We thought we were in love. And, you know, maybe we were. But this all happened so fast, and I realize again and again how we don't really _know _each other that well." She leaned her forearms on the breakfast bar. "So much happened for both of us in that long stretch of time between high school graduation and when you came back for the medal ceremony. We both saw and experienced things – some good, but a lot that was truly awful – and the awful stuff neither of us are willing to open up to each other about. I just think," tears stung the backs of her eyes now, and she paused as her voice faltered, "if we really trusted each other, we'd be willing to share all the gory details and have those out in the open between us before we dove headfirst into a marriage."

"Is this about Hoyt?" Jane rolled her eyes. "I'm just struggling to understand where this is coming from, Jane. But I gave up asking questions a while back because you're a closed book!"

"Hoyt," Jane scoffed. "You're not listening. This isn't about one solitary, traumatic event in my life or your life that's stirring up all this angst. It's a whole…culmination of things that we haven't said to each other. Whether it's because neither of us felt comfortable enough with the other, or it's a trust issue, or we both just have problems with talking about our feelings…I don't know, Casey. And that's, I guess, the point I'm trying to make." She felt herself softening as she came down from her anger, while his was just beginning to simmer dangerously. "Casey, honey, we don't understand each other. I think we both think we've tried. But it's clearly not enough. We ask things of each other and can't seem to meet in the middle. And I –"

He held up a stiff hand. "Jane, you're not calling it quits, are you? Are you quitting on me?"

"Just…Casey, listen –"

"No, Jane." He held up a hand. "I've heard enough. I gave up the Army for you. I let go of a promising career because I _loved _you. And you weren't willing to do the same for me. But I decided to roll with it."

"But Casey, as ungrateful as this sounds, it's true: I never _asked _you to abandon your career in the Army. Ever. Those words never left my lips." The disappointment in his voice and facial expression hurt more than she expected. She could feel the lump expanding painfully in her throat, the waver in her voice.

"But I made that sacrifice anyway!"

Like a bolt of electricity coursing through her body, Jane felt anger and whiskey heat her skin. It felt like sparks of heat were skittering over her hair follicles, giving her hot goosebumps along her forearms and the back of her neck. "What, so you could play martyr later even though you kept pressing me to leave my work while you made the oh-so-silent sacrifice out of your own career?"

She could tell it the moment those words left her mouth. The look on his face said everything. _Too far._

A grim silence settled. It wafted through the closed door and sat down between them like an unwelcome spectator to their acrimony. His face was pale and looked unnaturally tight with strain and suppressed rage. Finally, after several tense minutes that felt like hours, he began to nod.

Jane winced, wondering at the conclusion he'd come to.

She didn't have to wait long. "I think you might be right."

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant.

"I think we are done here."

Jane's phone, sitting face up on the breakfast bar between them, chimed once.

Casey couldn't help himself. He glanced down at the notification on the lock screen. He sniffed quietly. "Maura," he said under his breath. His jaw rippled at the corner as he clenched and unclenched his teeth. He looked up at Jane. "Guess this is goodbye. Sorry it couldn't work out between us."

"I'm sorry, too," she whispered brokenly. But some part of her already felt lighter. Relieved.

He paused after opening the door, his back to her. "I'll miss you, Jane. And I…think you're making a mistake. People say and do things when they're grieving…"

"Don't." Jane just leaned over the breakfast bar, over the last shot she still hadn't drank. She couldn't respond beyond that. The moment the door shut behind him, she thought she'd cry. But nothing happened. She felt choked off, dry inside. Hollow.

With a shaking hand, she finally lifted the shot glass and swallowed that burn one more time.

* * *

"Jane? Honey, what's wrong? It's one-thirty in the morning!"

Jane's grip on the phone tightened when she finally heard her mother's voice after the fourth ring. She took several breaths, but couldn't bring herself to speak.

"Janie. Tell me what's going on."

"I can't sleep, Ma," she whimpered. "I'm sorry to bother you, but I…I just feel like I'm losing my grip."

"What, are you having nightmares again? Is anybody with you?"

She shook her head even knowing her mother couldn't see her through the phone. She bit her lip. The tears were finally coming. _No, I'm alone. In more ways than one._ "No. That's what I get for pushing people away." She sniffled bitterly and wiped her nose.

"Jane, have you been drinking?"

She nodded. "Yes." She buried her face in the palm of her free hand. "Yes, because I can't get it together, Ma. I'm screwing up. Again. Always, it feels like. I married the wrong person."

Her breathless confession earned her a few seconds of stunned silence from the other end. "What do you mean?" A rhetorical question. Her mother knew exactly what she meant. "I don't understand. Is there another man?" She sounded truly incredulous, and Jane winced.

"No, Ma, I…no." She sighed, rubbing her temples, the back of her neck.

"Do you want me to come over and talk about it?"

"No!" The last thing Jane wanted was her mother seeing her in this pathetic state.

"Too late. I'm coming over. Stay right there, baby." And she hung up.


	25. Chapter 25

The door opened and shut but Jane did not lift her head from where it rested face down on the counter. Every corpuscle of focus she had left she devoted to the sensation of cool fake granite against her forehead. Warm fingers pried the empty shot glass from her grasp. She heard the click as it was set aside, heard the hollow scrape as the whiskey bottle was pushed away.

"Jane." Her mother's voice. Her mother's hand on her back. "Jane, look at me."

Jane slowly lifted her head and turned to face her mother. She blinked in the sudden brightness of the kitchen lights.

"Tell me what's going on. In here," she brushed Jane's hair back from her face, "and in there," she pointed to Jane's chest. "Give me something to work with."

Jane directed her dull gaze to the whiskey bottle. "I feel like I'm making all the wrong choices, Ma." She met her mother's eyes.

Angela nodded.

"But what makes it worse is that I don't realize I've screwed up until it's too late to fix it."

"Honey, it's never too late to try to fix something."

Jane just dropped her forehead to rest on her hands, clenched together on the countertop.

"You gonna tell me what's wrong, or do I have to sit her all night?"

Jane swiveled slightly on the barstool and took her mother in. This woman, sitting next to her in plaid cotton pajama set, her expression weary but determined – this woman had raised her. This woman loved her unconditionally. Stubborn as they both were, they'd seen each other through many a personal crisis. This woman deserved her respect and her trust. She brushed aside some rebellious dark locks that had fallen into her face.

It was time to start talking. She sucked in a deep, shaky breath and let it out. "I married the wrong person."

Angela nodded again, looking perplexed. "You said that on the phone. You wanna explain that to me?"

"Casey came over."

Angela's eyebrows rose toward her hairline.

"Yeah, I was surprised, too. He found me," she gestured to the case files now strewn across the limited counter space of her tiny kitchen, "like this. Wanted to know what was up. And yeah, it was nice that he was concerned, but then he basically started asking when I was going to be done grieving Frost so he could come back into the picture. And I lost it."

Angela watched her daughter's face.

"I think we're getting a divorce." Jane forced herself to look her mother in the eye.

"Jane, every couple has their setbacks and struggles –"

"Yeah, Ma, but this is more than just a temporary thing!"

Angela pursed her lips, silenced for now.

"Look. I saw red flags when we were dating, and when I had the first inkling he'd ask me to marry him. He kept hinting, then not-so-subtly asking me to seriously consider giving up being a cop for him. And even before that, he basically had every intention of abandoning the relationship when he was injured and thought he wouldn't be able to have it exactly the way he dreamed it with me. But I didn't talk about those. I ignored them because ultimately I thought I was making everybody happy. And I thought I'd be happy, once he came back around. I thought I loved him. And I do…I do care about him, Ma. Don't get me wrong. But tonight I realized that we…we just don't _know _each other that well. Because for whatever reason, we can't trust each other with the deep stuff." She clenched her fists on the countertop. "The important stuff. Neither of us can be with someone who's a total closed book, but neither of us is willing to be the first one to really open up about what we've been through. We're people that go out deliberately into fucking dangerous situations to help other people, but we're too chicken-shit to share about how damaged we really are." She swiped angrily at the tears that had gathered in the corners of her eyes. "So really, I guess this is something that's actually been snowballing for me for a while. And the shit finally hit the fan tonight." She sighed heavily, staring at the random flecks of color in the imitation granite that comprised her kitchen counter. She looked up when she realized her mother had remained silent. "You haven't said anything."

"Now seemed like the time to listen to you, rather than talk."

Jane managed a watery, lopsided smile.

"But Jane," she took her distraught daughter's hands, "I just want you to be certain that this is right. I mean, you're tired, you've been drinking; you've just been under a lot of stress lately."

Jane felt her shoulders draw up and her jaw clench – familiar sensations of resistance to being told what to do. "Ma…" she growled.

"Hear me out." Her mother held up a hand, voice and expression stern. "I'm not writing off this decision you're in the process of making. Maura's been telling me that it's important I make sure you know that your feelings are valid to me. And they are. I want you to know that, honey. I don't doubt for a second anything you've just told me. But as your mother, I want to advise you to wait just a little longer so you have some time to think about this with a clear head. No one should make life-changing decisions in the state you're in now. Understand?"

Jane nodded tentatively, anger dissipated. She felt like a little girl in Catholic school again.

"But, if a couple of days from now, you've thought about it and you still feel the same, then do what you think is right for you. Even if it's hard. And know you've got my blessing." She cupped the back of Jane's head and drew her in for a kiss to the temple. "You're my daughter. No matter what, I will love and support you through anything. Never ever forget that."

Relieved and touched, Jane allowed herself a few quiet tears in her mother's presence. She leaned in more fully into Angela's embrace and found her breath. Her mother gave her a reassuring squeeze.

"But I know that's not all," Angela murmured.

Unease pooled in Jane's stomach again, replacing the giddy relief she'd felt only moments ago. Fessing up to her abruptly failed marriage now seemed like a cinch compared to what she had to tell her mother next. Sure, she'd handled the idea of divorce remarkably well, but Jane still harbored a slough of misgivings about how she'd react to –

"You said you married the wrong person. Twice. Which makes it sound like there's…someone else? Is there?"

"There's not – I'm – it's not," she stopped for another deep, bracing breath. _Just spit it out._ "I'm…I'm in love with…my…best friend, Ma. I'm…I'm in love with Maura."

Angela's arms went slack around her. "Jane."

_Oh God, what? What did I just walk into?_

"Jane…Does she know this?" There was an urgency in her mother's inflection that surprised Jane.

"Well, yes – sort of. Not…I mean, technically…look, it's complicated."

Her mother shook her head and seized Jane by the shoulders. "This is simple. Have you looked Maura in the eye and told her, 'Maura, I'm in love with you'?"

"Not…verbatim?" Jane cringed.

Angela stared at her, jaw slack. "Why the hell not?"

"Ma, why are you so on fire about this? I don't understand…"

"Have you seen the way she looks at you? Everyone else has, I'm certain, but you apparently haven't because you're so tied up inside about this but haven't said anything!"

Jane's jaw snapped shut. "I thought – you're not upset that I'm…?"

"In love with a woman? Jane, I've been living on this planet too damn long to care who falls in love with and marries who. And especially when it comes to my kids, I really just want two things: whatever's good for them, and whatever'll make them happy. And Maura, I think, does both for you. You're at your very best with her. And you do the same for her. And the look in her eyes when you're together – she _loves _you, Jane. She cares about you more than anything else – or anyone else in the world. That's so rare. You shouldn't let what you two have slip away." She squeezed her daughter's hands.

Jane was taken aback. Part of her could hardly bear the relief she was experiencing, but some unease remained. "But I think Maura's known how she feels about me for a long time, where I'm just figuring things out, and if I say something now it might –"

"You never know until you try, though."

Jane looked away.

"Hey, better to have the guts to just stand up and do it, as opposed to torturing yourself forever with not knowing because you wouldn't even give it a shot."

Jane groaned and buried her face in her hands. She knew her mother was right. She knew she'd hate herself if she never took a chance on this. If she chickened out.

Her mother stood up and grasped her shoulders tenderly. "I'm tired; you're exhausted. It's almost three a.m. Just promise me you'll think about everything." She kissed the top of Jane's head.

Jane nodded, face still in her palms.

"Go to bed, baby. I'm willing to talk whenever you feel you need it."

"G'night, Ma."

"Goodnight, sweetheart."

"Ma?"

Her mother paused at the door. "Yes, baby?"

Jane swallowed hard, feeling choked. "It's too late to drive back. You wanna…stay?"

"You want me to?"

Jane nodded.


	26. Chapter 26

**A/N: So, I'm continuing to get awesome feedback on this even though my rate of update is horrendous. I apologize for keeping you all waiting for so long in between chapters. I'm doing my best to make up for trying your patience with quality writing. Working two jobs makes it difficult to find time and energy to thoughtfully craft sentences, though. My point is, I'm forever grateful to all of you for your patience, attention and comments. It really does encourage me to keep going. This chapter is on the long side, so I hope I don't bore you. More to come soon!**

A barrage of too many decibels at too high a frequency assaulted Jane's brain at six-thirty in the morning. She slammed her palm ineffectually against the nightstand a few times before she succeeded in silencing the alarm clock's shrieks. She rolled onto her back and threw her forearm over her face with a groan. Disgust and self-loathing came like a slap to the face as she remembered the pitiful manner in which she had ended her night.

_Just get up and face it, _she thought_. Lying here doesn't make it suck any less, and damn sure doesn't solve anything._

Her phone lit up on her nightstand, indicating new notifications. She checked the screen, scrolling with her thumb through all the random bits of information for which the device was programmed to alert her. As soon as she saw the email from Maura time-stamped about six hours prior, she sat up and opened the message. Everything else could wait.

_Jane,_

_I realize the timing of this is not ideal. But then again, timing has not been a strong suit for either of us lately._

Already, Jane was crestfallen. She could tell by the tone that she was not likely to be happy by the conclusion of this email.

_You and I have been through a great deal together. I feel privileged, honored, and unbelievably fortunate to have you in my life. You are a far better friend than I could ever have hoped for, and words cannot express how grateful I am for the positive impact you have had on my life and on me as a person. _

_Since we first forged our friendship, I have secretly lived in fear. This fear is not all-consuming; it does not cripple my rationality or cause me to act drastically. But it has been a constant presence in my mind, both when I am with you and when we are apart. It is the fear of losing you, Jane. And a large part of what drives this fear is the knowledge that there are so many ways in which I could lose you._

Jane paused and shook her head. "You're not losing me, Maura," she thought aloud. "You haven't lost me."

_Thankfully, this hasn't yet happened – though I feel we've come too close too many times. But I've tried and failed to ignore this constant vague feeling of standing on the edge of something and being afraid of the drop, yet being unable to take a step away and return to solid ground. In the past few months it has only intensified. I've done some thorough self-examination, both physiologically and psychologically. My findings are difficult to admit to, but nevertheless I feel it is important to share them with you. _

_I'm afraid that I've come to depend on you too much. I think I need you too much. My emotional dependency on you does not put either of us in a position that is conducive to mental and emotional health and stability. I don't feel I'm being fair to either of us if I continue in this way. _

_I've tried everything I can think of to be a helpful, empathetic, and supportive friend for you while you've struggled with your grief over Frost. You've taken it very hard, Jane, and it's been heartbreaking to watch you battle every single day. But I've also seen the steps you've made towards acceptance, and while they've been slow and painful, it has brought me true joy to witness your resilience yet again. I know you have your limits, as do we all, but you are such a strong woman. You possess more courage and tenacity than anyone else I've known. I have no doubt whatsoever that you will eventually make it through this, with or without my help. _

_In the past few days you have said some things in your grief and anger that have made me think. And the conclusion I've come to is that I need to let go of you, at least for a while. I've given you time and space to sort through your emotions, and now I feel the need to do the same for myself. I do not mean to abandon you. This email is not to notify you that I am leaving Boston or the Police Department. My devotion to my job remains as strong as yours. Nor do I intend to sever my ties with you or your family. I still count you as my very best friend. Moreover, I still love you, Jane. That, I am convinced, will never change. _

_All I ask is for some distance, time, and understanding. And when I am ready to be close again, I can only hope that you will still have me. _

_Sincerely,_

_Maura_

Tearfully, Jane closed her email app and set her phone aside. _Congratulations, Jane, _she thought with a sardonic sniff. _You finally succeeded in pushing away one of the few people left in your life who you can't live without. _

Joe Friday whined and crawled up into Jane's lap, where she rolled over and wagged her tail hopefully. Jane wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand and rubbed the dog's belly for a few moments. "I'm glad I have you, Joe. Because if you knew even half the stuff I've pulled, you'd think I was pretty stupid."

The scruffy terrier mix licked Jane's fingers, then licked Jane's face, no doubt tasting the salt on her cheeks. "Alright, little girl," Jane sighed. "Let's refill your food and see if I can't do anything to fix this."

For the first time in a while, Jane was actually frustrated that her hovering mother wasn't still at her apartment in the morning. Angela had left early so she could begin her day at the cafe, leaving Jane a note as to her whereabouts. Jane had groaned when she read it, wishing her mother had still been around to be her daughter's sounding board.

The detective was tempted to make a stop at Maura's house on her way to the precinct, but realized that choice would be contrary to her best friend's wishes. She felt that talking to her mother could have helped her come to a decision, but that could not be helped now. Nevertheless, she felt the need to see Maura, to assure herself that the medical examiner was alright, and to at least verbally acknowledge that had received the message, understood its contents, and intended to adhere to and respect her desire for space. At the last traffic light before she arrived at BPD headquarters, she drummed her fingers on the steering wheel, caught up in a cyclone of internal conflict. Ultimately, though still unsure if she'd made the right call, she pulled into her usual parking spot with every intention of going straight to Maura's office to very briefly acknowledge Maura's email and make the first of many apologies she felt she owed the woman.

She stepped through the swinging double doors into significantly colder temperatures than the rest of the building. In the sweltering heat of late summer, she was grateful for the normally uncomfortable chill in the air of the morgue. She glanced around the austere space, rubbing her palms together – an old nervous habit.

No Maura.

Allowing herself a soft snort of disappointment, she swiftly returned to the elevator. She promised herself a sixty-second detour to Maura's office before she made her way to the bullpen.

The tentative knock she applied to the door of the office was unnecessary. Jane bit her lip at the sight of the empty desk. Almost of its own volition, her hand reached for her cell phone in its belt clip. She knew full well there would be no new communication from Maura to be seen on the screen. Just the same, she felt an anxious clenching in her gut at the sight of the blank lock screen.

_Maybe I should have stopped by her house._

"Have any of you seen Maura?" The words were out of her mouth before she had even stepped out of the elevator onto the homicide floor.

"Good morning to you, too," Frankie piped up from his makeshift desk near where Frost used to sit.

Jane rolled her eyes and looked to Korsak. The sergeant shrugged and shook his head. "Only heard she got called to a scene by another precinct. Apparently they wanted the Chief Medical Examiner on this one."

She leaned back into a petulant slouch and crossed her arms.

"I think they were pulling a car from a creek. Some fishermen found it this morning. Could break a cold missing persons case wide open," Korsak added.

Jane sighed. "Did you hear where it was?"

"Somewhere near the edge of Worcester county, I believe."

_Great, _Jane groaned internally. _She'll be gone most of the day. _"Hope she'll be okay out there."

"I'm sure she'll be fine."

"Janie," Frankie chimed in, "wanna hear something that'll cheer you up?"

She could tell by the light in his eyes as he looked at her over his shoulder. "You've got something on the Felton case?" Her dark gaze flicked eagerly from her little brother's suppressed smirk to the grin playing at the corners of Korsak's lips.

"Better," he said, and flipped open his laptop.

In two long strides Jane reached his side.

"I had some help," Frankie began, rapidly clicking and typing to bring relevant information to the computer screen, "but I did some deep digging into the drug trafficking guy. The one who…"

Jane nodded. _The bastard who killed Frost. _"Who helped you?" Jane asked, with a significant look at Korsak, who put his hands up.

"It wasn't me, though I'd love to take credit for this one," the sergeant admitted.

"Martinez," Frankie said.

Jane frowned, then made the connection. "That's right! Korsak, you said this guy used to be Martinez's CI. Glad to hear he's finally doing something right for once."

"Jane, you won't be half so bitter when you hear the doozie that Martinez basically dumped in our laps," Korsak admonished.

The detective returned her gaze to Frankie's laptop screen, which now displayed a very ubiquitous mug shot of a potentially mixed-race male. Thick, dark mustache, greasy head of hair, and cheeks pock-marked with acne scars. An unsavory character, to say the least.

"Charles Lopes Ruiz," Frankie announced. "Known on the streets as 'the Lobo'."

Jane rolled her eyes again. "What are the odds."

Frankie pointed. "This is his mug shot from when he was arrested in '04 for possession with intent to sell. The amount he had on him, plus what they found stashed in his apartment was enough to put him away for a little while. They caught him dealing by night over by Charlestown High."

Jane nodded. "Got it. No real shocker there. Gimme the meat, Frankie."

"Hang on a second." He pulled up another page over the man's face. It was a newspaper clipping. "This barely got any press, which is probably why it's been overlooked so far. But in '09, some kid supposedly coming back from spring vacation visiting her grandparents in Mexico gets shot and killed in the crossfire of some cartel border war. Her name was Cristina Ruiz-Adams. Her mother was Sheena Adams. Her father was –"

"Charles Ruiz," Jane finished for him. She straightened and began to pace.

Frankie nodded. "Our guy was in Boston at the time, and when he found out he went straight to Martinez, completely devastated."

"Martinez said Ruiz wanted to be his CI. 'Begged' was the word he used," Korsak said. "Said he wanted to help bring down the drug market that took his girl. It sounded like Ruiz volunteered to get back in the game, to infiltrate the drug trafficking circles in Boston using his former connections from before he did time."

Jane halted her pacing for a moment. "There's gotta be more to it than that. Something had to have happened for him to turn on Martinez like that."

Korsak shrugged. "He wouldn't share anything beyond that."

"What makes you think the whole CI offer wasn't a ruse to begin with?" Frankie asked.

"He lost his kid, Frankie. For even the most hardened people, grief can be a strong impetus for change." She paced one more complete circle.

"Okay, that last part definitely sounded like Maura."

"Shut up, little brother. Wait." She stopped behind him again, staring intently at his computer screen. "What's that?" She pointed to the corner of a page, mostly obscured by other windows he had open. "Blow that one up."

Frankie did as she told him.

It was another article, dated more recently. More of a tiny news blip than a real story. An update on the death of a pre-teen girl on the US and Mexican border. What would possess an editor to even dredge up such a tragic, dated tale in the quest for fresh news, Jane would never understand but –

**12-year-old girl caught in cartel crossfire on the border was smuggling drugs**.

Jane's jaw dropped.


	27. Chapter 27

Martinez visibly clenched his jaw as a printout of an old news article he'd hope to forget was slapped on his desk right under his nose.

"Did you know about this?" Jane demanded, shoving the clipping forward with her forefinger.

He sighed and sat back in his chair, looking up at her with a sad smirk. "What do you want me to say, Rizzoli? My CI had his daughter smuggling drugs across the border, and he came to me because she died on the way. Things went wrong. They always do with drugs. You used to be DCU. You know these things."

"Oh I know," she snarled, snatching the paper up. "I know what happens with drugs. But what I _want _to know, is why in the hell you didn't think to say anything until now? It's been weeks and we've all been floundering around for leads on this…this ghost…and you've been sitting on this," she held up the paper, "the entire time?"

"Rizzoli, I…"

Jane yanked a chair from an empty desk behind her and sat down across from him. "You're going to tell me everything. Right now."

He leaned forward, his voice low, expression subdued. "I really think you know most of what there is to tell. The only thing I can add is that when I found this out," he pointed to the article now in Jane's lap, "I confronted him about it. I couldn't trust a man who had only just recently been using his child to move drugs across the border. Not when he failed to tell me that from the start. He got angry and ran out on me." He ran a hand across the top of his bald head. "He disappeared. Even I couldn't find him. And believe me, I tried." He shrugged. "I know you're disappointed, Rizzoli, but really that's all I have for you."

Jane shoved to her feet, the wheels of the chair she'd been sitting in scraping loudly across the floor.

"Now that I think about it," Martinez interjected, holding up a finger, his gaze distant, "he did say something. In the heat of the moment. He said…something about…that people who bought from him needed to know they were purchasing the deaths of children and families."

Jane scowled, her mind whirring. _Children. Kids. Families. Brothers. Sisters. Friends. Schoolmates. _"Kids. School. High school. Charlestown High! I _knew _that sounded familiar!" With that, she bolted.

"Shawn Felton taught at Charlestown High!"

Frankie looked bemusedly at Korsak before turning to his sister, who had just come striding into their midst. "This…isn't exactly news, Janie."

"No, but…look." She strode over to the glass board plastered with the photographs of all persons relevant to the case. "If Ruiz was caught dealing over by the high school, that could've been how he met the Felton brothers. Or at least Drew. Remember, Shawn was the only family member Drew had any sort of contact with after becoming an addict. What if the three encountered each other there one night?"

"That sounds like kind of a long shot, Jane," Korsak replied.

Jane stared at Ruiz's mug shot as if she could burn a hole through his face with her pupils. She shook her head. "I know I'm reaching…but my gut says this is as strong a lead as we've had in too long."

Korsak's desk phone rang. "Sergeant Detective Korsak. Oh hello, Mrs. Kuziemski! Yes, of course. I understand." He glanced up at Jane. "Would you mind if I brought Detective Rizzoli along? Okay. I appreciate you calling. Talk to you soon." He hung up. "Jane, grab a notepad and something to write with. We're going to pay Mrs. Kuziemski another visit, and I have a feeling we'll be _very_ interested in what she has to say."

Jane grinned and grabbed her blazer of the back of her chair.

Frankie through his arms out, silently demanding to be included.

She pointed firmly at the ground. "You stay, rub elbows with the drug unit. Learn what you can learn. We'll trade notes when Korsak and I get back."

"I want to apologize again for being too afraid to tell you the whole truth from the beginning, detectives," Mrs. Kuziemski sighed once they were all settled in her living room with coffee and fresh cookies.

Jane gave the elderly woman a soft, reassuring smile. "We appreciate that. We also appreciate that you're willing to level with us now. Facts – true facts – are what's most important to us. More than anything we just…just wanna get things right the first time."

Korsak gave her a brief, knowing look before flipping open his notepad. "What can you tell us about the Felton brothers?"

Age-spotted hands straightened the edges of the lightweight lavender cardigan Mrs. Kuziemski wore. "Well, as you know, Shawn student taught under me before I retired. I think he was my favorite student teacher. It was clear he loved the kids, loved sharing what he knew, loved watching them grow and learn. I don't think anything made him happier. He was…most alive, I think, when he was in the classroom. And the kids really loved him, too. He got them excited about reading and writing. He made it about expressing themselves effectively rather than just satisfying criteria and meeting curriculum standards. I believe everyone has their calling, and those that find theirs are the lucky ones. Shawn was one of them." Her eyes grew distant.

Jane cleared her throat after a swallow of coffee and leaned forward slightly, keeping her voice low. "Did he…did he ever talk to you about his personal life?"

Mrs. Kuziemski looked her straight in the eye. "Did he ever mention his brother, you mean." It wasn't a question. "You don't have to beat around the bush with me, detectives. I'm not as fragile as I look."

Jane couldn't help but smile at the fire in the old woman's eyes and hope that she was as sharp at that age.

Korsak chuckled. "Fair enough."

Mrs. Kuziemski sat back in her armchair. "Shawn rarely said very much about his family. I think, even though he had his father's favor, he didn't appreciate how his parents responded to his brother. He only opened up to me about Drew on a couple of occasions, but those moments – let me tell you – they were very telling." She nodded, reaching for her mug on the coffee table between them.

"How do you mean?" Korsak prompted.

"He knew Drew was into drugs, and a couple of times he expressed his frustration to me: 'Drew is back in rehab again,' things like that. When I asked when the last time he'd talked to Drew was, he'd just shrug and say, 'I told him I'd only talk to him when he's clean.' He said he really didn't know what else to do, but he didn't want to reinforce behavior that was killing him."

"Sounds like he was really conflicted," Jane said.

"Shawn had such a big heart. I could tell it was hard for him to decide what the best thing to do was when it came to his brother."

Jane nodded. "Did Shawn seem like the type who would confront someone who he thought might be…enabling his brother's drug habits?"

Mrs. Kuziemski shook her head. "Shawn was a peacekeeper. He hated conflict. He wouldn't avoid it, but he also would never seek it out, and if he came across any disagreement, he'd try to help resolve it as peaceably as possible."

"He sounds like a real stand-up guy," Korsak said.

"He was. It was hard for him to talk to his brother about addiction because he hated conflict so much. But in his spare time he armed himself with research, looking for ways to help Drew, or how Drew could help himself. So when I found out that the high school was going to be providing use of the building to an Addicts Anonymous group two nights a week, I told Shawn immediately. I assume he told his brother, because the next thing I heard about Drew was that he was getting rides from Shawn to the school the same two nights a week.

"I retired that summer – though I'm sure some of the faculty thought that was something that should've happened years ago," she continued with a dry chuckle. "Shawn promised to keep in touch throughout the school year, and he was a man of his word. He mostly wanted feedback on lesson plans or had a story to tell about a student in his class. I heard very little about Drew, so again, I assumed things were mostly fine. Then he turned up dead. Shawn was heartbroken, of course. But he kept teaching. He threw himself into working with the kids because they were his primary reason for going on." She took another long sip of coffee. I think it was two or three weeks after that…a strange man came into the building during school hours, claiming to have a child in Mr. Felton's class. He apparently had no way of proving he was the father or legal guardian of any student enrolled at the school, so he was sent away without further ado. Someone from the office told Shawn and Shawn emailed me about it. He didn't sound too concerned, but then it was hard to tell from the message." Another sip of coffee. "And before you ask, he didn't provide any description that he might have been given from the front office, so I can be of no help to you there."

Jane sat riveted while Korsak finished frantically scribbling on his legal pad. "That's alright, Mrs. Kuziemski. You've already given us quite a lot. I think we've got a decent idea where to go from here," Jane said.

The retired teacher smiled and rose from her armchair. "Glad I could be of help at last. And again, I am sorry I let my paranoid son talk me out of talking to you before."

"You're talking to us now, and that's all we care about." Korsak stood, straightening his blazer and extending his hand. "Thank you so much for calling and inviting us into your home, Mrs. Kuziemski." He headed for the door.

The old woman shook Jane's hand as well once they were all standing. She waited until Korsak was out of earshot. "It was really you who convinced me to call the sergeant back." Jane couldn't quite keep the puzzlement from her expression. Mrs. Kuziemski squeezed her hand. "Forgive me if I'm making you uncomfortable." Jane shook her head, genuinely curious. "When you all arrived at the crime scene, I couldn't help but notice your body language…even from a distance it appeared you had a personal connection to this case. And when you had to step away for a moment…I couldn't get that image from my mind. Seeing your struggle reminded me of Shawn. I had to call to help him get justice."

Jane reciprocated the squeeze to her hand, struggling for words. She was embarrassed that this woman had witnessed her breakdown, but also relieved in a way. This woman was so perceptive. She was like Maura in a lot of ways: her love of knowledge, the drive to educate others…but most importantly, her deep empathy for suppressed emotion. "I understand. And…thank you for sharing that with me. It means more than you know."

Mrs. Kuziemski patted her shoulder as they made their way out. "Best of luck, detectives."


	28. Chapter 28

**A/N: **At this point I feel ashamed even to apologize for how late this update is...but I'm going to say "I'm sorry" anyway. My life has been absolutely manic these past few months. Before that I had the worst case of writer's block EVER with this story. Excuses, excuses, I know. Also, this chapter is pathetically short. I owe you guys so much more. But it's all I can get out in the time I alotted myself. There is definitely more in the works, with some steady progress towards our Rizzles endgame. I promise you that. :) In the meantime, please enjoy this little appetizer while I work on more of the main course.

Maura's phone buzzed obnoxiously from her nightstand just a little after 5 a.m. She'd just been dreaming about wanting to talk to Jane again, but being constantly interrupted.

"Doctor Isles." Her voice scraped out of her throat in a grossly unprofessional croak.

"Doc," came the familiar voice from dispatch, "there's been a girl found in an alley dumpster downtown. They want you to come take a look. We're texting you the address now."

She sat up and swung her feet down over the side of the mattress. "Alright. Thanks. Tell the team I'll be there in twenty minutes."

"You got it. I'll pass that along."

Her phone chimed with an incoming text message the moment she ended the call. With the address in hand, she readied herself as quickly as possible and arrived promptly on the scene.

Uniforms were setting up ladders against the sides of the rusty, green, industrial-sized dumpster. The garbage container was against the wall of a nightclub, now closed for the day. A service door leading from the back of the club opened up a few yards away from the dumpster. Aside from the usual busyness of a fresh crime scene, the surrounding streets were eerily quiet and still. The city's night-owls were retreating to sleep off the night's revelry, and none but the earliest of risers were out and about at this time. She wondered vaguely which of the two varieties of city dweller lie dead in the dumpster.

A premature cold snap that belonged to early autumn had made its move southward from Canada, stealing the moderate morning temperatures from the typical late summer Boston climate. A brisk wind swept down the nearby cross-street, causing Maura to draw the edges of her blazer more tightly around herself. She ducked under the crime scene tape. A uniform turned to her from leaning a ladder against the dumpster.

"Made sure not to move the body, Doc. Figured you'd wanna take a gander at her the way she was found before we disturbed anything."

Maura proffered a grim, tight-lipped smile to the baby-faced officer and snapped on some latex gloves. "Thank you," she said with a nod. Mounting the ladder, she couldn't help but think the young man reminded her of Frost in a lot of ways.

She reached the highest rung she was willing to stand on and peered down into the reeking refuse. A pale, redheaded woman, likely in her early twenties, was sprawled unceremoniously on top of the heaps of waste. One foot still had its stiletto heel on; the other was bare. She was clad in a short, strapless cocktail dress whose hue Maura would have characterized as a pale peach. A closer glance drew her eye to a small slip of paper tucked between the top hem of the dress and the woman's left breast. Maura reached with a gloved hand to remove it. An achingly familiar voice murmuring from the mouth of the alley about the cold and the "ungodly" time of day stayed her hand.

Jane was hunched with tension and cold, her face drawn and shadowed. Her arms were stiff, her hands jammed so deeply into shallow pockets, Maura feared for the soundness of the seams. Maura's left fingers curled more tightly around the unyielding metal lip of the dumpster as she pushed herself to a more upright position. It was a moment before she even realized she was imagining Jane's hand in hers as it used to be some days; tendons, muscles, veins and bones rolling delicately beneath her fingertips as she attempted to massage the cold-induced ache from scarred appendages.

Jane's eyes shifted upward, and Maura _felt _the exact moment that the detective registered her presence. A palpable air of apprehension settled around and between them, and those dark chestnut eyes flickered with hesitation and…longing? Maura shifted her weight on the ladder and returned to the bit of paper tucked in the dead woman's dress. She pulled it free without disturbing the body unnecessarily, and unfolded it. A white lily, pressed and dried, fell from the folds. The scrawled note read: _Time to pay the piper._

"God, she scares me every time she does that," Jane murmured to Korsak. She felt herself twitching with worry as she observed Maura's precarious descent from the dumpster to the asphalt. When her heels reached the ground, Maura looked up, her warm gold tresses flicking back from her face and over her shoulders. Their eyes met, and Jane lowered her gaze sharply. Her eyes locked on Maura's hands. She pointed. "What do you have there?"

Maura proffered the folded note to Jane. "He left us another message."

Jane quickly pulled on some gloves of her own and plucked the note from Maura's hand. "'Time to pay the piper'?" She cocked a brow in spite of herself and looked to Korsak as he stepped up beside her. "Who's paying the piper and what are they paying for?"

Korsak shrugged. "I think Doctor Isles will agree that we have to know more about the victim before we can say what that means."

Jane nodded and looked to Maura. "Find anything else on the body?"

"I haven't finished looking at her yet." She turned back and retraced her steps to the ladder leaned against the dumpster. Jane followed. "I wanted you to see that note first. But there was another dried lily inside the note, too."

"Hm. And what are the odds she's got some nasty mix of oxycodone and ketamine and God only knows what else in her bloodstream?"

Maura shrugged. "I'm unable to speculate until I've completed an examination."

Jane hesitated awkwardly at the foot of the ladder, eyes downcast. She bit the inside of her cheek.

"Oh. Rhetorical question," Maura amended. "Sorry."

"Mind if I…?" Jane asked, gesturing up the ladder sheepishly. Maura nodded her assent, and as Jane ducked her head to begin stepping up the rungs, she could have sworn she saw the ghost of a smile on the detective's lips.

Raised voices and the sound of guns being drawn halted Jane's progress up the ladder and brought Maura's head around sharply.

A skinny kid in a stained hoodie and torn jeans was standing right against the crime scene tape with his hands in the air and wide eyes. A number of uniformed officers working the scene now had their weapons trained on him.

Jane practically bounded back down the ladder. "What's going on here?" She demanded.

"He just tried to duck under the yellow tape," Korsak murmured matter-of-factly.

Jane huffed in exasperation. "Of all the moronic, dangerous…damnit, kid!" She stalked over to the edge of the crime scene to where the adolescent was still standing, frozen.

"I just wanted to talk to somebody about the girl!" he said, his voice pitched with fear. He pointed toward the dumpster with a shaky finger, not daring to put his arms down. "I saw some shit last night…"

Jane scanned his face for a moment, then turned to the officers at her back and raised a hand. "I'm gonna talk to him," she said in a level voice.

"Stand down," Korsak ordered, and all drawn guns were swiftly holstered.

Jane turned back to the young man. "You can put your hands down now." She lifted the tape as he tentatively lowered his raised arms. "I'm coming out there. I want to hear what you have to say." She cast a glance over her shoulder as she ducked under the tape, catching both Korsak's eye and Maura's.


	29. Chapter 29

**A/N: This chapter is insanely long. You have been warned. Hopefully you find it worth your time. I was very excited to write this one. **

As Jane ducked under the yellow tape with the boy, the medical examiner discreetly drew three calming breaths in and out. Her pulse rate was slow to decelerate from its frantic, adrenaline-charged pace. The blood still pounding to her extremities caused a ringing sound in her ears.

The surge of fear that had assailed her upon seeing all the officers present with their guns drawn, and Jane once again recklessly stepping in the midst of potential danger, brought a flush of heat like an electric charge to the surface of her skin. This was immediately followed an equally intense wave of cold - like being doused with ice water - which set her muscle groups quivering and her teeth on edge.

At one time, Maura would have vehemently reprimanded Jane for scaring her like that. The detective, in turn, would tease with a quip intended to diffuse Maura's anxiety with laughter. Maura could still clearly hear Jane's exact tone of voice and feel Jane's hand on her arm as the detective would have proceeded to gently and sincerely reassure Maura that everything was fine now.

At one time, Maura would have believed her.

But the pins-and-needles sensation now worming it's way to her fingertips left her thoroughly confused. She had just experienced a fight-or-flight response...to watching _Jane _ step into a place of danger. Maura herself had not been the one in immediate physical peril. Yet she felt the fear, felt her body react, as though she had been the one approaching a potential threat. The confidence she had gained during the time she spent distancing herself from her best friend seemed to dissipate like an insubstantial cloud of gas. The thought of losing Jane still frightening her as much as ever.

And now she was fighting hyperventilation while Korsak looked at her like he might look at an incendiary device.

"Maura? You okay?" Korsak's unusually timorous voice penetrated her tunnel vision and opened the crime scene back up to her senses. She purposefully made eye contact and nodded. He watched while she straightened her shoulders and reassessed her surroundings.

"Good." He held out an iPad. "They were right quick about getting fingerprint ID results back to us. Gotta be because she's the mayor's daughter."

Maura's eyes came up from the iPad screen to meet Korsak's. _He's joking. He must be joking. _"I'm sorry...say that again?"

The sergeant shrugged in the direction of the dumpster. "That's Mayor Roman's daughter in there."

"What's your name?" Jane walked the kid a safe distance away from the crime scene.

"Dominic. Dominic Adams." In addition to his clothes, which had clearly seen better days, his face was drawn and shadows crouched beneath his eyes. His arms hung limply at his sides.

"Okay Dominic. Tell me about last night." Jane adjusted her stance, attempting to find the right balance of authoritative but non-threatening.

Dominic pivoted on the worn soles of his old high top sneakers and gestured to the length of the alley in which they stood. "I pass by here once in a while, and last night I was heading to a friend's to crash for the night. And I -"

An officer came up to Jane, interrupting the boy. "Detective, we have positive ID on the vic." He held out the iPad that Korsak had been holding.

Her brows flew up. "That was fast."

He nodded. "They found her fingerprints already on file."

She took the tablet. "Really? Who is she?" Then she looked at the profile. Inhaled sharply through her nose.

"She's Kendra Roman. The mayor's daughter," Dominic said matter-of-factly.

She spun to face Dominic, who had been standing meekly by with hands stuffed in the pockets of tattered jeans. "Alright, how do you know her?"

The kid shrugged. "We went to school together. Had a couple of the same classes...she was good at math, I remember."

"Where'd you go to school?"

"Charlestown."

Alarm bells went off in Jane's head. She looked back down at the iPad to confirm. "Get Korsak over here, please," Jane said to the officer. Then she looked back at Dominic, passing the iPad back to the officer. "How well did you know her?"

Another shrug. "Sometimes we'd pass each other in the hall. We'd talk."

"What about more recently?"

"I ain't even seen her since graduation...until last night."

"Jane." Korsak's voice.

Jane turned to look at him. He was holding his cell phone to his ear and pointing at it. In the same moment, she saw Martinez approaching.

"He's got the mayor on the phone," Martinez said. He looked grim as usual.

Jane sighed. Turned once again to Dominic. "Alright, finish telling me about last night."

He nodded. "I was walking down this way and saw her duck out that back door," he pointed to the nightclub's service door near the dumpster, "for a smoke. She saw me, and said hi. I said I didn't think I'd ever see her light up, bein' the mayor's perfect baby girl and all that. She just laughed. She started to say something else, but then this shady-lookin' car comes off the street and pulls up and she tells me to get lost, it's not safe. I'm all like, 'What the hell,?' right? But she seems like she means it, so I duck behind that dumpster. I couldn't hear everything over the engine and the music from the club, but I'm pretty sure the driver used to deal her some shit. Couldn't tell if he was sellin' smack, or E, or what. But she said she doesn't do that anymore and she told him where to go. They yelled back and forth and then the car just peeled out and drove off. Then, like maybe a couple minutes later, I start to come out of hiding, but then this guy comes up, I start to holler at her to get down, but then he's already grabbed her from behind, and I'm scared shitless now and she puts up a helluva a fight, man. And I remember his voice sounded like the guy from the car. But then all the sudden, she's down in his arms, like dead weight. He lifts her up, gets up on some boxes, and dumps her in there." He pointed to the dumpster. His hand shook.

Jane's brow furrowed. The cold of the morning caused her hands to twinge, and she folded her arms.

Dominic shook his head. "Then he climbs in with her. He was in there for a while. Couldn't tell what the fuck he was doing, and I didn't want to know. Then he stood up and climbed out, and just before he walked away, I saw him stop and turn. Got a pretty good look at his face. And saw him chuck something small in the dumpster, kind of as an afterthought, you know?"

Jane turned sharply to a nearby crime scene tech. "We find anything else in the dumpster besides the girl and the flower?"

The tech shook her head. "Not yet, Detective. Anything in particular we _should _be looking for?"

Jane turnyed back to Dominic, but he shrugged. "Dunno. I wanna say it was a needle, but I was so scared then that who knows what the fuck I saw. I found a friend's pad and got blind wasted, but still couldn't sleep. That's not something you forget easy, y'know?"

Jane nodded, and met Korsak's eyes. He was just getting off the phone. Martinez, next to him, was also on his cell, and Jane could only imagine it was the press. News vans were already starting to roll past the alley, searching for a place to park.

Jane rolled her eyes. "Looks like the media's got a whiff of this. Dominic, would you be willing to come with us back to the precinct for a few more questions? I think Sergeant Korsak will want to hear what you have to say."

The kid nodded, looking bewildered and unimaginably exhausted. She took his arm to gently lead him to the nearest squad car when she saw Martinez staring at her, a few yards away. He slowly lowered his phone from his ear.

Jane frowned. "What -?"

"RIZZOLI!" Martinez shouted.

Jane pivoted sharply towards the point over her shoulder where Martinez had been looking.

Charles Lopes Ruiz, looking decidedly more grey of hair than in his mugshot, but still as greasy and deranged, stood with a wide stance at the far end of the alley. He raised his arm stiffly, gun in hand, and fired.

The gunshot split the cold, still air of the morning like a thunderclap.

Maura spun on her heel from where she had been directing crime scene techs with moving the body. She watched Jane drop with the speed of reflex and take Dominic down with her, covering him with her body.

_No. Not like this. Not now. _

Jane rose with some effort to a semi-crouched position and looked straight at Ruiz, who was inexplicably still standing in the same spot.

Martinez came from behind her and brushed past, drawing his gun and bearing down on Ruiz.

Ruiz bolted.

"He's bleeding!" Jane screamed, looking down at Dominic. "Get an ambulance!"

Maura practically bounded to her side. Jane was already applying pressure to a wound in his side. There was a lot of blood, but from what the ME could see, it was only a shallow graze and not life-threatening.

"Son of a bitch," Jane murmured hoarsely. "Hang on Dominic, we're gonna get you some help. It's gonna be okay." She huffed sharply and looked up into the alley where Ruiz had been standing. Her dark eyes burned, and it scared Maura. But she knew what needed to happen next.

Maura stilled Jane's hands, already covered in blood. "Go," she said. Jane looked at her sharply. They could both hear the sounds of pursuit coming from the walkie-talkies around them.

Jane leaned her forehead against Maura's for the briefest of seconds, never breaking eye contact.

_Take care of him. I trust you. Thank you._

_I love you._

Maura could clearly read each of those messages in Jane's eyes.

Then she was on her feet, climbing in a squad car, and screeching off in hot pursuit.

Detective Jane Rizzoli was not about to lose yet _another _kid to some homicidal maniac.

The scanner on her dashboard was giving her garbled information, but it was just enough for her to know where she could go to possibly head him off.

She skidded to a halt near some food carts just in time to see Ruiz round a corner and go pelting down a side street. Cursing that she had just missed cutting him off, she slammed the car door shut and broke into a sprint, her path quickly converging with that of Martinez and a few other officers and detectives who had been following the perp.

Ahead of them, Ruiz slowed to turn yet another corner. One of the detectives fired off a shot and missed badly. But Ruiz stumbled, and that gave Jane enough time to gain a few steps on him.

He was surprisingly agile, but she'd be damned if she let him get away now.

Frost's face flashed in her mind, and she redoubled her pace.

Ruiz stumbled over some boxes as they went pounding through another narrow alley, but before Jane could grab him, he was up and sprinting into the street.

Morning traffic was in full swing, and a taxi just narrowly missed him as a light turned from red to green.

"Rizzoli! Wait!" Martinez shouted, but Jane ignored him. She was almost to the intersection.

"Jane!" Korsak's voice. The light turned yellow.

She leaped into the street. Ruiz had made a diagonal beeline across the intersection and it looked like he was about to disappear into another alley if she didn't catch him quickly.

Cars screeched, skidded and honked at her, but she kept running.

"JANE!" She heard Korsak's shout blend with the drawn out blaring of a horn just seconds before the grill and hood of a green sedan slammed into her side.

She rolled off the hood of the car and collapsed in an awkward heap on the asphalt.

Martinez hustled to her side to help her up, and Korsak began directing traffic around them.

Before Martinez could ask if she was alright, she stumbled to her feet and pressed on. Her side twinged a little, but adrenaline was coursing through her. She lengthened her stride, and sprinted into the alley she had seen Ruiz duck into.

The alley opened into a loading zone and delivery yard for a warehouse. Ruiz was clambering onto some crates to hop a fence at the far end of the delivery yard. Jane pounded after him, knowing that once he got over the fence, the chase was as good as over.

When she was close enough to hear him panting with effort, he turned, fired a crazy shot that ricocheted off the ground near her feet, and started to run toward the warehouse.

"C'mere, you son of a bitch!" She seized a fistful of his jacket and horsecollared him. As he lost his footing, she tackled him into a stack of crates. Asphalt bit into her knees through her torn slacks. Ruiz writhed beneath her while she fought to restrain him and reach her handcuffs. He smashed an elbow into her ribs on the same side that the car had hit, and she grunted. Shoved him further into the ground.

Behind her, sounds of Martinez, Korsak, and the other detectives could be heard behind her.

"Charles Lopes Ruiz, you are under arrest for the murders of Kendra Roman, Shawn and Drew Felton, and Detective Barry Frost," she growled in his ear. He tried to squirm away, but she pinned his shoulders and pressed her knee into his back.

Martinez held his hand out. "Rizzoli, I'll take it from here."

Jane dragged Ruiz to his feet, gripping his arms firmly behind his back. "He's all yours, Martinez," she rasped. "But I get first dibs in interrogation."

Martinez jerked his head in a nod, knowing better than to try to argue with her.

"You gotta learn to leash your _perra_, Martinez," Ruiz leered at the DCU detective. He spat in the Jane's direction.

Martinez grabbed him roughly and hauled him off to a squad car that had just pulled into the delivery yard, Mirandizing him as they went.

Korsak grabbed Jane's arm as she lunged after him. "Rizzoli," he warned. Much as they all wanted to cave the guy's face in, he couldn't stand by and let her destroy her sterling reputation as a good cop.

She stilled. Her tunnel vision faded, and she once again became aware of her surroundings. Then a plunging sensation roiled suddenly in her gut.

She turned to face Korsak fully and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Where's Dominic?"

"He's at the hospital getting stitched up. The bullet only grazed his side. He'll be okay."

She nodded. "Okay." Drew a deep breath. Released Korsak's shoulders. "Okay. We gotta get back. Is Maura still at the scene?" She started walking to the nearest squad car. As the adrenaline drained from her bloodstream, pain began to register in her side. Intense, burning pain. She started to clutch her ribs, but stopped herself. She'd deal with any injuries after she dealt with Ruiz.

Korsak steadied her with a hand on her elbow as she started to limp slightly, but said nothing. "I assume she's headed back to the precinct for autopsy if she hasn't already made it there."

_As long as she's okay, _Jane thought.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed. More to come. Please keep reviewing! I love you guys! P.S. I JUST FOUND OUT THIS FIC HAS BEEN NOMINATED FOR BEST ANGST IN THE RIZZLES FAN AWARDS SND I HAVE YOU GUYS TO THANK FOR THAT SO THANK YOU SO SO MUCH


	30. Chapter 30

**A/N: Magical chapter 30 has arrived! Your support and enthusiasm for this story has been so crucial in the continuation of this story. I truly cannot thank you all enough. Please continue to read and review, and enjoy this latest chapter!**

Still reeling from the events that took place at the crime scene, Maura did her level best to contain her leftover jitters. She needed to be in complete control of her judgment and emotions for this case. They all needed to conduct and on-point investigation to get justice for Frost. "Just bring her right her for the time being. I want to begin testing as soon as possible." She pointed to a clear space on the morgue floor where she wanted her techs to start setting up Kendra Roman's body for autopsy.

Susie Chang entered the morgue from the crime lab right as the body was being wheeled in.

"Hi, Susie." Maura snapped on some gloves.

"Doctor Isles. I have good news." Susie was holding a small evidence bag out to Maura.

Maura took the bag. "What's this? A syringe?"

Susie nodded. As you were bringing Miss Roman's body in, one the officers from the crime scene came bursting through the lab doors. He had this bag. He said he found it in the dumpster and that you'd want it immediately."

"He was right."

Susie shifted her weight, face aglow with excitement. "I'm sure Detective Rizzoli would say something like, "What are the odds that syringe has traces of a very specific drug cocktail inside?"

Maura suppressed a smile. "Yes, she probably would. And while I would normally remind her that science does not jump to conclusions, I think if we were to guess, it would be relatively safe to assume that not only would the syringe contain traces of ketamine and oxycodone, but that there might still be traces of DNA on the needlepoint."

Susie leaned in close and lowered her voice, her eyes practically sparkling. "And if we're really lucky, whoever handled it last _wasn't wearing gloves._"

All guesswork aside, the mere possibility of such damning evidence putting a nail in the proverbial coffin for this was thrilling. Maura could no longer contain her grin.

For once in her life, Maura was tempted to follow Jane's example, and punch the elevator button repeatedly to make it go had been plenty of developments in plenty of cases that merited this level of excitement, but because of their especially personal connection to this case, Maura was downright impatient to get the news to Jane.

Finally, the elevator arrived to take her up to homicide.

"Hey, Doc," a homicide detective greeted her once she stepped inside.

"How are you?" Maura responded politely.

"How's the Ruiz case going? I heard there was a shootout in an alley this morning!"

Maura shuddered to recall it. "The suspect returned to the crime scene and saw a witness talking to Ja - Detective Rizzoli. He had a gun, and he fired."

"Damn. Everybody okay?"

"Yes, thankfully. The witness was grazed on his lower right abdominal region, but the wound wasn't deep. He was taken to the hospital. Jane, Detective Martinez, Segeant Korsak, and some others ran after him and eventually caught him." She sighed.

"Good on 'em. Was it Ruiz?"

She nodded.

The elevator dinged, and they both stepped out. Maura immediately noticed Jane's desk was empty.

Seeing her looking around for signs of Jane, her elevator companion spoke up. "Last I heard, she was in interrogation."

Maura sighed again. "Of course." She moved into the hallway, the rapid clips of her heels on the floor alerted everyone of her approach. Officers and detectives alike were all quick to make way for her.

When she came to the right room she paused with her hand on the door. _This is it. Deep breaths, Maura. This could very well mean the end of this nightmare._

She stepped into the observation room adjacent to the interview room. Martinez, Korsak, and Frankie were all inside already, watching the exchange. Through the one-way window, she could see Jane seated across the steel table from Charles Lopes Ruiz. There was a closed manila folder on the table in front of Jane. She could not see Jane's face, but could easily surmise from the detective's forward posture and rigidity that it was taking every ounce of willpower not to do harm to the man across from her. Ruiz, for his part, matched her stance - he was leaned forward in his chair, meeting her stare for stare.

"What do you people expect me to say?" he sneered. "I know my rights."

"Yes. We informed you of your full rights upon your arrest. But you look like you want nothing more than to take credit," she opened the folder and pulled out a series of crime scene and autopsy photos, "for every," she dropped each one in front of his face, one at a time, "single," she stood and laid her hands palm flat on the tabletop, "one." She loomed over him, raven hair falling to either side of her face, stance exuding a predatory confidence.

Tears spilled down Ruiz's face, but his mouth opened in a leering, deranged grin.

On the other side of the window, Maura's heart pounded. She could see that the last photo Jane had placed before Ruiz was one of those Maura had taken herself during her autopsy of Frost.

Ruiz shook his head and began to quietly chuckle. "No one was going to care, or know, or even pay attention...no one was gonna give a shit until they lost someone. Until I took away _their _kids." His grin and laughter disappeared. His acne-scarred face seemed to tighten in rage.

"He honestly thinks the only way to get the word out about the murder of his daughter was to kill more people," Martinez murmured next to Maura.

Maura nodded. "The average rational person seeks empathy from others as a means of coping and validation for their emotions. A chemically imbalanced person, however..." She knew she didn't need to finish that sentence for the benefit of anyone in the room. Each of them had witness more than their share of the damage that could result from improperly managed psychosis.

"You know what?" Jane's voice came through the speakers connected to the interrogation room. "I'm sorry you lost your daughter. That's not something I would wish on anybody. Truly."

Ruiz scoffed.

"But no matter what manner of shit life throws in your face, no matter the terrible decisions you make to fall in such a hole - in my world, there is _no goddamn excuse _to take someone else's life." Her voice had dropped to a harsh whisper. Her hand hung, trembling almost imperceptibly, over the photo from Frost's autopsy.

"They all had connections to the drugs that killed _mi hija. _They were just feeding into the system."

"Bullshit," Jane barked.

"I should go in there," Martinez said quietly. He moved for the door.

"No," Korsak interjected. He looked Martinez square in the eye. "Let her have this one."

The DCU detective let go of the door handle and came back to join them at the window with a sigh.

"What about Shawn Felton?" Jane demanded. "Huh? He was a teacher! Kids _loved _him! He inspired them! And...Detective Frost? What about him? He was doing...his..._job. _Neither of them smoked so much as a cigarette._"_

"They got in my way."

"Trying to stop you from hurting more people! A _sane _person seeks help. A _sane _person does the _right _thing. A _sane _person _doesn't kill people._"

As if sensing he was losing this battle, Ruiz began to pant, his shoulders heaving up and down. "You can't prove I did any of this," he hissed through clenched teeth.

Jane almost laughed. "Ohhh yes we can. We have a witness who can put you at the scene of Kendra's murder, and we found the syringe you used to inject her with a specialized drug cocktail." She pointed to the door. "And I have officers and detectives from both homicide and our drug control unit who can attest to you firing the shot that killed Detective Frost." She leaned down, her voice low and raw with pent-up fury. "And I can assure you, there is nothing more that any of us want than to see you locked up for that, you monster."

Ruiz leaned back, the chain linking his handcuffs rattling. His demeanor changed with a suddenness that made even Maura's head spin. "This Frost _chacho_. Did you sleep with him? Or was it only Rafi?"

Maura flinched from her side of the glass as several things all happened at once.

Jane lunged.

Ruiz fell back, his chair skidding on the cement floor.

Korsak and Martinez burst through the door.

"Rafi!" Ruiz swore up a blue streak in Spanish. He pointed at Martinez. "Imma kill you, Rafi! You fucked me over! You're gonna pay for that!"

Martinez moved quickly to restrain him. "Shut up, Ruiz. You're not killing anyone else. You're going away for a long time."

Ruiz struggled violently. His eyes fixed back on Jane, who was being held back by Korsak. "_Puta!_ I know you got a brother in the drug unit! I know where he lives! None of you are safe!"

Maura knew what was next. Jane could handle threats in most contexts. They came with the job. But the moment someone threatened her family, the proverbial gauntlet was dropped.

Jane lunged, and Korsak struggled to keep her contained.

"Jane! JANE, STAND DOWN!" roared the sergeant.

Martinez started to haul Ruiz toward the door, and Maura stepped in. She stopped beside Korsak, who was still grappling with an enraged Jane.

"I'm gonna kill that son of a bitch!" she cried.

"Vince, let her go," Maura said, her voice surprisingly steady and calm.

He looked at her doggedly. "You serious, Doc?"

Maura nodded, reaching for Jane. "Let her go. I've got her."

As Martinez walked Ruiz out, Jane lunged again, but Maura caught both her arms behind her back. She moved with a swiftness and strength that surprised herself just as much as it seemed to surprise Korsak. "Just give us a moment, Sergeant Korsak. Please."

Her expression and tone brooked no argument, so he stepped reluctantly out of the room.


	31. Chapter 31

**A/N: I'm excited to bring this story to its rightful and well-deserved conclusion. But at the same time, I'll be sad when I no longer am adding chapters. You've all been so great. Please continue to read, review, and enjoy! We are headed down the home stretch!**

**P.S. I sincerely apologize for the quagmire of html that was dumped on you from my previous upload of this chapter. I have no idea what caused that, but here's hoping that this time is a success! Thank you to everyone who messaged me or wrote in the reviews that this chapter was wonky.**

Jane's heart pounded. Her chest heaved and her ears rang. Her gut was in knots. Maura gripped her arms firmly but gently.

Her ribs on her right side screamed in protest, punishing her for her outburst just moments ago.

The door to the interrogation room thudded shut behind her, putting a barrier between herself and that monster Ruiz.

Maura released her slowly, and Jane fell forward, bracing her hands on the tabletop. "I let him bait me," she said quietly. "I let another monster get to me." She shook her head. "Fuck," she whispered. She shoved away from the table, clutching her side. "Thanks for having my back, Maura," she murmured, and pushed through the door.

Maura gave her a minute to retreat. Quid pro quo, she thought. Jane had been making a concerted effort to respect the boundaries Maura had been trying to enforce, so Maura would do the same for Jane.

She went into the observation room and picked up her crime lab test files where she'd left them. She still needed to tell Jane the good news.

Jane leaned over a sink in the restroom, eyes shut, shoulders hunched, thinking only about breathing.

And Maura's arms around her.

Another wave of pain swept across her ribs, and she shuddered.

The bathroom door swished open.

Heels clacked on tile. Jane heard the steps come to a halt a few feet away, as Maura stopped to observe her. She opened her eyes and looked at her friend.

"Hey."

"Jane," Maura said softly, and edged closer. "Are you okay?"

The detective angled her shoulder just a little, opening her stance to let Maura know it was okay to approach. She tried to relax her body, but the pain in her side would not allow it.

Maura set her case files down and squeezed her shoulder.

Jane began to shiver. The aftermath of her rage left her cold and drained. Then Maura's voice was in Jane's ear, soft and low. "Jane. Listen to me. It's over. You caught him. We're going to put him away."

Jane leaned ever so slightly into Maura. Shook her head. Tried to focus on slowing her breathing. "I lied about the syringe. I was bluffing," she choked out.

"I know you were bluffing. But you didn't lie."

Jane startled violently and turned her head to look at Maura out of the corner of her eye. "What do you mean?"

Maura's fingertips brushed the small of her back. "One the last officers to leave the scene did a final sweep of the dumpster. He found a syringe, bagged it, and brought it straight to the lab. I put a rush on DNA testing."

"And?" Jane's voice sounded strained.

"Positive. Kendra's blood on the needlepoint, Ruiz's fingerprints on the syringe. Trace elements of the same cocktail that killed the others." She felt Jane relax ever so slightly, and she moved her hands up to grip Jane's shoulders. The detective's knees buckled slightly, and she released a gust of pent-up breath.

A tidal wave of relief cascaded over her, leaving her gasping and fighting tears. "It's over," was all she could say. "It's finally over." She couldn't believe it. She could barely breathe.

"Deep breaths Jane." Maura stroked her back. "It's over. Just take a deep breath for me."

Jane made a concerted effort to fill her lungs. She stopped at only half capacity, ribs wracked with excruciating pain. She doubled over, leaning against the sink and shaking her head.

"Jane! You're hurt...what happened?"

Jane shook her head again. "Nothing. Just an elbow to the ribs from Ruiz. I'll be fine." She swiped a stray tear from the corner of her eye.

Maura's heart melted at the sight of tears from her fiercely stubborn best friend. She realized with startling clarity that she was done separating herself from this woman. "May I...hug you now?"

Jane's head swiveled in surprise. Her facial expression said quite clearly that she wanted nothing more. She stepped away from the counter to face Maura and opened her arms slightly.

The moment she felt the medical examiner's arms come around her waist, she thought, Acceptance. I've reached acceptance. Frost was gone, and she had finally accepted that. Her heart had always belonged to Maura. She accepted that too.

She gave her best friend a gentle squeeze. "Forgive me for being an ass for so long?"

"We've both said and done some very foolish things."

Jane pulled away to look at her face. She took Maura's hands. "I hurt you." God, this was hard to say without crying. "I hurt you when we were both already in so much pain. Nothing can excuse that. But I'm asking you to forgive me anyway. I sound like a broken record, I know, but I'm so so sorry, Maura."

Maura gave her a soft smile. "I forgave you a long time ago, Jane." She drew her friend back into her arms.

Jane released a single sob. "I do love you, Maura." She wanted to explain that she meant she was in love with Maura, that she wanted Maura to be her other half for the rest of their lives, that she had never been so sure of anything ever. But her voice betrayed her. It would have to wait. She would have to hope that Maura understood and would continue to be patient with her.

Maura nodded against her shoulder. "I know you do. I love you, too."

She felt Maura's hands move to her waist and gently rest there. She couldn't help but smile through her tears. Oh yeah. I think she gets it. She's always understood you.

Maura gave her best friend one final squeeze before releasing her. She gave a start when the detective flinched and hissed a sharp intake of breath through her teeth. She pulled away from Jane to look her square in the eye. "You can't take a full breath, and hugging hurts. Don't tell me this was just an elbow to the ribs. You've taken on worse than that and not been in this much pain."

"Maura, I'm fine. I just-"

"Bruised it?" Her hard, hazel gaze froze Jane into silence. "Jane, you were limping when you left the interrogation room. You are not fine." She reached slowly for Jane's side again. Jane trembled, but held her ground.

The ME's fingers were feather light, at first - gliding over each of her ribs. Jane could hardly stand it. Half of her brain was going wild with instinctive alarm signals to avoid pain. The other half was going wild with excitement at Maura's touch. She clenched her jaw. Tried to hold it together. Tried not to lose her mind to the schism of her conflicting desires.

Maura honed in on the area that appeared to be the epicenter of the pain. She slowly, gingerly pressed the tips of her fingers against Jane's ribcage. Her instinct was rewarded with another flinch and an expletive from the detective.

"Jesus, Doctor Isles!" Tears of pain sprang unbidden to Jane's eyes and she angrily swiped them away, taking a step back from Maura. She clutched her side with both hands and looked at Maura like she had been betrayed.

"Take off your shirt."

The detective's eyes nearly popped out of her skull. "We're in the bathroom. I love you, but I'm not sure I'm ready to - yes, Doctor Isles." Maura's no-nonsense stare once again elicited Jane's compliance. She shrugged off the blazer she wore and laid it on the counter between sinks. Shaking fingers rose to the buttons of her shirt and started plucking them through their holes. Soon, the shirt was off and laying on the counter atop the blazer.

"Now let's see. Roll up your tank top."

Jane obeyed, but slowly. She seemed uncharacteristically timid.

Maura stepped closer, her fingers now working in tandem with Jane's to lift the hem of the tank top. She leaned down to peer at Jane's side. She gasped once Jane's ribs were exposed. A brutal storm of contusions colored her side, dark and angry. Maura's hand hovered over the injuries, fingers trembling almost imperceptibly.

Rising to her full height, she looked into Jane's dark eyes, so full of apprehension. "Do you want to tell me the truth, or shall I ask Korsak what really happened out there?"

The detective shook her head. "It was stupid. I -"

"I need to know what happened so I can determine what proper treatment will entail."

Jane had never seen her look so stern. She bit her lower lip and dropped her gaze. "I ran after Ruiz into traffic. Some asshole didn't stop in time. Practically made a hood ornament out of me in the middle of the intersection."

Maura's hand came up to cover her mouth, her brow deeply furrowed in concern.

"I didn't really feel much until after we caught him." She shrugged. "Guess it was the adrenaline."

Maura nodded. "It has that effect." She huffed an anxious sigh. "We need to get this looked at."

"You just did..._Doctor_."

"No. I'm taking you to the hospital. At the very least you have a fractured rib or two. But bruising like that could indicate much more serious damage to your internal organs. Blunt force trauma of this magnitude could cause ruptures...a punctured lung...and without an x-ray, I'm unable to say with any certainty how severe your injuries are!"

Jane gestured vaguely in the direction of the door. "Maura, you have and x-ray in the morgue! I see you use it all the time!"

Maura couldn't deny that. But neither could she deny Jane trying to discreetly lean against the counter to take some weight off her injured side. She felt sick with worry. "Damn your tough facade." She stepped forward and gathered Jane's blazer and the lab results.

"What did you say?"

"Put your shirt back on. You're going to the hospital, whether you like it or not." Her voice quavered precariously.

"You know how much I hate hospitals." She peered at Maura's face. "Oh God...are you crying? Maura, honey..."

"No! Don't." She pulled away as Jane started to reach for her. Seeing the hurt in her gorgeous, exasperating friend's face, however, she relented. "I would just feel much more comfortable if I knew you'd been examined by a doctor at the hospital. Would you grant me that, please?"

Shoulders slackened in defeat, expression softened. When Jane spoke next, her voice was subdued. "Yes." She sighed. "Okay, let's go." She pushed away from the counter, only to grab her side again.

Maura took her arm, holding her up and walking her to the door. She kissed Jane's cheek, unable to resist. "Thank you."

Jane stopped in her tracks just as Maura opened the door. Maura turned in the doorway to see Jane's fingertips were on her cheek where Maura's lips had just touched.

"Oh, Jane I'm sorry. I -"

Jane grabbed her arm and pulled her back in.

"Jane, what -?"

"I need you to understand something before we go any further." And she took Maura's sweet, lovely face in both her trembling hands and kissed her.


	32. Chapter 32

The elevator dinged and the doors rolled open to the homicide floor. Jane blinked as detectives rose from their desks to greet her with enthusiastic applause.

"Way to be an idiot, Janie."

Jane rolled her eyes at Frankie as Maura guided her out of the elevator and into the homicide bullpen. Of course he and Korsak would be there to chide her for bolting into a busy street after a perp. "I caught the guy, though, didn't I?" She rattled her bottle of newly prescribed pain management medication in his face.

He pulled her into a bear hug. "God, you're so stupid. You scared me!"

"She scared all of us," Korsak added, exchanging a look with Maura, who nodded. "But here she is: the conquering hero, home from the hospital." He chortled.

"Frankie, you're going to break more ribs if you don't let go!" Jane gasped.

Alarmed, Maura stepped in quickly, trying as politely as she could to extract her detective from Frankie's embrace.

Korsak took a bouquet of carnations off his desk and handed them to Jane.

"Flowers?" Jane took them, looking sheepish. "Korsak, you know I was just doing my job. We all were."

Frankie tapped her arm lightly with his fist. "Yeah, but you caught the guy, didn't you?"

They all laughed as Jane's mock bravado was used against her.

"Very funny, Frankie...ow. Maura, why haven't these meds kicked in yet?"

"It shouldn't be too much longer." Maura gently rubbed her lower back beneath her blazer.

The applause died down as detectives all returned to their desks. Korsak looked at his watch. "I think it's time we called it a day." He looked to Jane and Maura. "Buy you guys a drink? You, too, Frankie."

Jane moved gingerly to her desk. "I still have some paperwork to finish up, but after that I will take that drink."

"Aw Janie, you can finish your pencil pushing in the morning," Frankie said.

Maura cleared her throat. "I'm not entirely sure Jane is going to be here tomorrow morning."

"Whoa!" Jane wheeled on her. "Controlling much?"

"Jane, if you want your ribs to knit quickly, you need to rest so they can heal."

"Whatever, Doctor Mom. We'll see. But I do want to get this stuff done today. One less thing to worry about tomorrow." She lowered herself carefully into her chair.

"Wise." Maura smirked. Jane flashed her that winsome Rizzoli grin, and Maura beamed. _We're happy, _she thought. They'd come through hell, and maybe they were a little singed, a little scorched in places, but they'd earned the right to smile again.

She looked at Korsak. "You guys go. I'll catch up in a few minutes." She returned her gaze to Maura. "Meet you there?"

Maura shook her head. "I'll wait for you. I'm not letting you drive under the influence of pain medication."

"Aww, that's sweet." She waved to Frankie and Korsak as they headed for the elevator. Once they were out of earshot, she reached for Maura's hand. "It's nice to know I have a designated driver whenever I need one."

Maura resisted the sudden urge to kiss the backs of Jane's fingers in front of the entire homicide unit.

"You sure you wanna hang around and watch me do paperwork?" Jane asked as she pulled open one of the top drawers of her desk.

Maura smiled. "I don't mind. We've both done our share of watching each other 'push pencils,' as Frankie would say." She pulled up another wheeled desk chair. She peered at the manila envelope Jane laid on her desk. Watched Jane hesitate to open it.

She read the words "Civil Court" in the return address. "Jane...what is that? Is that even for a case?"

Jane looked at her, inexplicably sheepish. "Divorce papers. Casey sent them."

Maura instantly regretted her decision to separate herself from her best friend when she did. Jane likely would have informed her, had she not been so determined to honor Maura's request for space. "Jane, I...I had no idea. I was too caught up - I'm sorry."

"There's nothing to apologize for. It's not your fault." She pulled the papers out of the envelope and held them up. "This right here is a compilation of mistakes that he and I made," she laid them flat on the desk in front of her, "and our failure to fix it like adults and compromise. No one but us is responsible."

Maura watched Jane scrawl her signature on all the designated lines. After signing the last page, Jane turned to her. "I think I have a pretty good idea what you're thinking right now."

"Do you?" She felt herself start to flush under Jane's scrutiny. The woman could still read her like a book.

"Yeah," she husked. "And we will."

"We will...? I'm not sure I follow."

"We'll talk about it. All of it. I owe you better communication. But I want to wait. At least until it's...just the two of us. Is that okay?"

Maura took a few seconds to consider. "Yes. Of course. I'm glad you're open to discussion. But...have you told anyone else about this?"

"Ma knows. She came over after the fight that did us in."

Maura tilted her head. "When was this?"

"Um...well, it was the night we ran into each other at the gym."

"Oh." Maura winced.

"Yeah. Just throw that on the mountainous pile of things I'm sorry about. I went home, hit the case file again. Did more drinking than crime-solving that night, to be brutally honest. Then Casey showed up. Come to find out: whiskey is Jane Rizzoli truth serum." She rubbed her face with her hands. "I said a lot of things that I needed to say, but with the worst possible delivery." She sighed, face hidden behind her palms.

Maura wrapped her fingers around Jane's forearm. "You can tell me the rest at home. But I think if you're done here, we shouldn't keep Korsak and Frankie waiting."

Jane lifted her eyes to Maura as the medical examiner stood and held out her hand. She managed a weak smile, and let Maura lead her to the elevator. "Can we at least stop by my place so I can change?" She looked down at herself.

Maura laughed softly. "I was just going to suggest that. Your slacks are looking a little worse for wear."


	33. Chapter 33

"I never asked you what the doctor said. What's the prognosis? That sedan nailed you pretty hard." Korsak took a swig of Samuel Adams while he and Frankie made room for Jane and Maura in their usual booth.

"Ugh, don't remind me," Frankie groaned.

"Two fractured ribs and a bruised lung," Maura provided.

Frankie's eyebrows flew up.

Jane shrugged. "I got off lucky."

"Yeah," Frankie scoffed. "Dumb luck."

Jane punched him in the arm. "You sound like Ma!"

"Good thing somebody'll speak for me when I'm not around."

"Ma!"

"Angela! Come join us!" Korsak beckoned her towards the booth as Jane stood slowly to hug her mother.

"All those years harping on you as a kid to look both ways before you cross taught you nothing?" Angela demanded as she gathered her daughter into her arms.

"In Janie's defense, it coulda been a lot worse. And she ended up catching the bad guy, Ma," Frankie piped up.

His mother glared at him over Jane's shoulder. "You two always defend each other."

"I'm sorry, Ma." Jane released her mother and they both sat. "I'm sorry I scared you guys. I swear, I don't do it on purpose." She laughed, but Maura saw that telltale swipe of thumb beneath nose.

"But we're all so happy that you're alive and safe now," Maura said, giving her forearm a gentle squeeze.

Jane nodded and swallowed the sentimental tears that threatened. "And I'm happyand grateful to be here." She smiled and accepted a bottle of Blue Moon that was brought by a server. "Also for beer." She looked at Maura. "And for comfortable clothes that aren't shredded to hell."

Maura received her glass of Cabernet Sauvignon and raised it with a chuckle. "I'll drink to that."

The others all raised their respective drinks.

Maura took a sip, discreetly monitoring Jane's facial expressions for any tells. Sure enough, dark brows drew down and eyes narrowed at the door. Maura tracked Jane's gaze to find Martinez and a couple of other detectives from DCU had just stepped in.

Jane felt her insides jump uncomfortably when Martinez made eye contact with her. His presence reminded her of the high-octane happenings from the alley this morning.

Maura felt Jane tense beside her, then pin her forearm protectively against her own ribs. The ME placed her hand lightly on Jane's leg beneath the table.

Martinez sidled up to their booth.

"Join us, Rafi?" Korsak offered.

"Thanks, but I promised my guys I'd have a cold one with them." He looked at Jane. "You did good, Rizzoli." He held out his hand.

She shook it. "Thank you. You, too, Martinez."

He released his grip and dropped his hand back to his side. "I mean, it was damn stupid running out in traffic like that. But I guess you did what you thought you had to."

Jane nodded and looked around her. "We all did."

"I think Detective Frost would've been proud."

Maura watched as Jane's veneer of composure slipped. Her eyes filled, and once again she swiped beneath her nose with the base of her thumb.

"I hope so," she said quietly. "Thanks, Martinez."

He gave a curt nod and backed away.

"God, I'm a wreck," Jane groaned once he was out of earshot.

Maura felt the detective lean just a fraction of an inch closer to her. She responded by silently weaving her arm between Jane's arm and her body, linking them.

_I'm right here, Jane._

"With Ruiz finally in the can, it feels to me like we can finally send Frost off," Korsak said.

Frankie nodded and raised his bottle, face solemn. "I second that."

Angela, Maura and Jane all raised theirs. "To Frost," Jane said, a catch in her voice. "This one's for you, buddy." As they each took a drink in honor of their fallen friend, a subdued silence fell over their booth. They seemed to breathe a collective sigh of release.

"Jane, honey, you're not wearing your ring," Angela remarked quietly. "Does that mean you've made a decision?"

"Decision...?" Korsak asked.

Jane exchanged a knowing uneasy glance with Maura. The medical examiner squeezed her arm gently. "Yeah, Ma. It does. I, uh..." She made eye contact with both Frankie and Korsak, then lowered her eyes to the table. "Casey and I can't see eye-to-eye. And we can't seem to meet in the middle." She looked back up to gauge their reactions. Frankie was frowning deeply, and Korsak looked concerned and very focused. "Losing Frost...well, there's no way any of us could prepare for that."

"You took it pretty hard," Korsak said.

Jane gave him a grateful smile. "I didn't handle it well, to say the least. But it made it crystal clear to me how...unrealistic our expectations were of a successful marriage."

"You can't force the grieving process," Maura provided.

Jane pressed just a fraction of an inch closer to her. She understood then what had been so unclear to her before.

Simply because she'd told Maura they couldn't be together did not mean Maura was going to abandon her entirely. And there was the startling difference.

The stark contrast between her relationship with her husband and her relationship with her best friend.

Casey's response to whenever reality fell short of expectations was to withdraw. If he couldn't have it the way he wanted, then he wouldn't have it at all. When he thought he would never walk normally again, let alone have children with the woman he was in love with, he left, abruptly dropping all connection with her as if it had never existed.

When he wanted to always be by her side, pushing and pulling her – sometimes quite forcibly – through her grief over Frost, she asked him for breathing room.

What he wanted was too much. He was too much. So he moved to a hotel for two weeks.

Maura never asked too much. When she did ask, she asked for just enough to get both her and Jane where they needed to be. But if Jane's response wasn't quite what she wanted, she would be disappointed, certainly, but she would accept it. Her love for Jane, in whatever form or capacity it took, was greater than what might please her.

And knowing this made Jane all the more eager to give Maura so much in return. She realized then, why it was always so easy to say yes to Maura, and such a struggle to say yes to Casey.

In that moment, it became clear to her that she was finally free to say yes to Maura.

"We, uh...aired our grievances a few nights ago."

Jane interwove her fingers with Maura's. Felt the gratifying squeeze from the medical examiner. Felt Maura's thumb sweep over her scar.

Frankie relaxed slightly where he sat. He looked relieved.

"But rather than clear the air, it just seemed to add to the tension." She shrugged resignedly. "We're just not compatible. And that finally became glaringly obvious. He sent me divorce papers the next morning. I didn't look at them right away. "She looked to her mother. "I wanted to think first. I've been doing a lot of screwing up lately, and I didn't want to make yet another mistake just because I was frustrated and hurt." Here she shared a look with Maura, who gave her a nod of encouragement. She took a heavy swallow from her bottle of Blue Moon. "It hurts to say it - to admit I made a mistake. But it, um..." Her voice failed her.

"We know you're picking up the pieces Jane." Korsak said. He looked to Frankie, Angela and Maura for confirmation. "We've seen it."

"Yeah, Janie," Frankie chimed in. "We're proud of you."

Jane sniffed. "You guys aren't disappointed in me for quitting?"

"My daughter's not a quitter," Angela said. "We know you better than that. We've all seen what you've dealt with, and we've seen you work through it. Your way. I'm proud of you, sweetheart. So proud," she said, and squeezed Jane's free hand. "I mean, let's face it - no mother _likes_ to see her child lose a friend and gothrough a divorce. But let's face facts," here she laughed, "between Vince and I, we've seen enough divorce to know that sometimes it takes just as much courage to leave a dysfunctional marriage as it does to get married in the first place!"

Korsak shrugged and chuckled. "Couldn't have said it better myself. Now, I liked Casey. I'd be lying if I said I didn't." He looked Jane square in the eye. "But I trust you to know what's best for yourself. If he wasn't the one, more power to you for ending it sooner rather than later. No point in dragging it out trying to force a square peg into a round hole."

Jane nodded, overwhelmed with gratitude at the support she was being shown.

Maura frowned. "I'm not sure that was the best use of metaphoric imagery in this context."

Frankie guffawed. Jane nearly choked on her beer. Korsak reddened. Angela just chortled. Maura beamed.

Jane turned to her best friend. "Doctor Maura Isles! That was a _very _inappropriate joke!"

"And a good one, too!" Frankie added.

Maura continued to grin. "We needed some levity. And that's a service I am always happy to provide."

"Oh God, don't make me laugh," Jane whined, holding her side.

"Okay, okay, I'll stop," Maura said, still chuckling. She looked at her watch. "In fact, I think it might be time to take you home."

Jane reluctantly inched her way out of the booth, but she did not protest. Though she longed to stay and celebrate with her family, she was exhausted and uncomfortable.

"Make sure she rests, Maura. I'm trusting her to your care," Angela said, with a stern look at Jane.

"I'll do my level best, Angela. You have my word."

Jane waved goodbye to Korsak and Frankie. She watched Maura flash a smile at her mother and her stomach dropped. Insecure as the medical examiner tended to be, she was always poised, coifed, gracious and kind. An ache in Jane's heart counterbalanced the ache in her ribs. _She's perfect, _Jane thought. _I wish she was mine._


	34. Chapter 34

**A/N: ****Sorry for subjecting you to another pile of html vomit. Here's the fixed chapter. I still have yet to get to the bottom of why FF does this to some of my docs. Thank you all for your saintly patience with my haphazard chapter uploads. I love you all. Please enjoy this latest chapter.**

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"Jane?"

"Mmph."

"Jane, wake up. We're here."

Jane opened her eyes to the sensation of Maura's gentle strokes on her forearm.

"We're home."

Jane met Maura's warm smile with one of her own. She liked the sound of that. A lot. "Thanks for driving."

"Of course. Come on, let's get you inside." Maura stepped out and around to the passenger side of the Prius. She helped Jane out of the car, surprised at her quiet compliance. "You're being awfully cooperative, Jane," she remarked lightly.

The detective hissed through her teeth as she rose from the passenger seat. "Oh don't worry. A little nap and I'll be making up for lost sass." She winked. "But right now I'm too preoccupied with thoughts of your couch to be witty and stubborn."

Maura laughed. "I see. Think you can make it to the door?" They began a slow walk to Maura's front stoop.

"Well, the other option of collapsing on the sidewalk would be unprofessional and embarrassing, so yes, I think I can make it to the door."

"Unprofessional!" Maura laughed again. "Then I'll make sure that doesn't happen." She unlocked the door and let Jane enter first.

The detective limped straight to the couch and sank slowly onto the cushions.

Maura watched her and felt a deep, settling warmth in her heart. She moved to the kitchen. "Can I get you anything?"

"Actually, just some water sounds really nice," Jane husked. "Please."

Maura joined Jane on the couch with a glass of water and a glass of Carignan. "Do you feel like talking?" Maura pressed gently as she passed Jane the water.

Jane made an effort to sit up a little straighter. "Yeah! Yeah, we can talk." She watched Maura's face carefully.

Maura idly swirled her glass, observing the burgundy liquid rolling around in lazy, off-center circles.

"Maura? Paging Doctor Isles?"

Maura looked up at her.

"Look. Before you start overthinking what you're going to say, just get it out there. Rip off the band-aid." She gave Maura's arm a little squeeze. "And if it hurts," she added quietly, "I probably deserve it."

Maura shook her head. "No Jane. You deserve a lot of things, but to be in pain is not one of them."

Jane sat back, thinking. "Okay, that's a start. Not the one I predicted, but let's roll with it. What do you...what do you think I deserve, Maura?" Her hands linked together loosely in her lap. Maura saw Jane's fingertips begin subtly pressing the scars on her palms. Despite the brave front, Jane was nervous. She was expecting - maybe even hoping - that Maura would verbally flog her and be done with it.

"Respect," Maura replied without hesitation. "Happiness. I mean it, Jane," she added when the detective's expression grew wary. "I've always said I want to see you happy. I want that so much. And I do think you _deserve _to be happy. However that manifests itself."

Jane swallowed. "What else?" she husked, her voice as low and soft as Maura had ever heard it.

"Love. You deserve love, Jane."

Jane turned her head, abashed.

Maura's heart pounded. She could feel it in her throat. She turned to face Jane more directly. "And I don't mean just affection, or just sex, though those are important. I mean...safety. Confidence in your relationship. Grace."

"Grace?"

"Yes. Freedom to make mistakes and be forgiven for them. Without conditions."

Jane sank into the couch, eyes on her hands. She drew a shuddering breath. Ran a shaking hand through raven hair. "But...Maura, you've given me all those things already," she whispered. She pitched forward and dropped her face into her hands. "God, I'm such an idiot."

"I tried very hard to look at your relationship with Casey objectively." Maura sighed. "To be brutally honest, I struggled with jealousy. But even after I set aside my bias, I was still frustrated because I felt you weren't getting what you need - what you _deserve - _out of that relationship, Jane."

Jane looked up at her, eyes swimming, lip between teeth, chin trembling.

"As your friend, I wanted so badly to protect you. I wanted to rescue you somehow, from an uninformed decision. But I also knew, as your friend, that wasn't my place. So I had to let you go, and it was by far the hardest thing I've ever had to do."

"But you did it," Jane said. There was no anger or malice in her voice. She was simply in awe.

Maura nodded. "I felt I had to. My responsibility was to support you in being your own person."

Jane shook her head. "You're amazing."

Maura blushed, but made no comment.

"You know, I've loved you for years. _Years_, Maura. But for any number of inane reasons, I convinced myself that...you and I - as a couple - we weren't even a blip on the radar of possibility. So I gave up hope. I made myself move on." She took a drink of water, stalling to gather her thoughts. "Casey was...convenient. And it felt good, being with him. Thinking I was in love. But with everything that's happened, I've been on this steep learning curve, and...I've discovered things about myself, about you, about decisions I've made...most of them ending up being mistakes." She forced herself to look Maura in the eye. "You say you still love me. Well, I still love you." Her voice shook, betraying the emotions she was fighting to contain. "I love you more than I've loved anyone. I realize that now." A tear escaped down her cheek. She dashed it away and gently took Maura's hand. "I don't want to screw this up. Again. I feel like I'm trying my best to do right, but lately it seems like I keep twisting things into bigger knots rather than getting it all untangled." The sensation of Maura's thumb brushing back and forth on the back of her hand made her breath catch and her pulse flutter. "I've lost my partner already. I'm ending a marriage. And you've seen how I push people away only to find out later that I alienated them when I needed them most. I lose you, and I'm...I really am fucked." She shook her head again and buried her face in her hands. "As much as I want to give it everything I've got to make this work, I'm so, _so _scared that I'll screw this up, and it will be my biggest failure, and my biggest regret ever." She pressed her fingertips to her forehead, deeply distraught.

This gave Maura pause. Jane admitting to being scared was a great rarity. "I don't think you're giving yourself nearly enough credit. And I've spent enough time analyzing and re-analyzing and _over-_analyzing my feelings to realize and accept that loving you is inevitable for me. And...I want to...give us a try."

Jane shook her head, shoulders hunching in presupposed defeat. Her face was hidden behind jet black curls and clenched fists. "I'm afraid I'm a lost cause, Maura."

Maura's heart constricted at the sound of dejection in Jane's voice. "No. I refuse to accept that." She wrapped her fingers around Jane's upper arm. "Jane, look at me. Please."

Jane obeyed.

Maura brushed wild, dark curls from her best friend's temple and held her face. "But say you were a lost cause." She smiled in spite of herself. Brushed a stray tear from her zygomatic bone. "You'd still be _my _lost cause. And no cause is truly lost until every last person who could possibly care has given up on it." She pulled back to look at Jane fully. "I can count on one hand the people in my life who have made me feel loved when I thought I was unloveable, who made me feel safe when I thought I never would be again. Who kept faith in who I was, when I was drowning in self-doubt. And your name has always been first on that list. I'm determined to do the same for you." She lowered her gaze, seemingly surprised by her own boldness. "Is that…alright?"

Jane nodded, at a loss for words. Tears spilled from her eyes, faster than Maura could wipe them away. Maura leaned in, then paused. This had to be right. "May I...?" she asked, still holding Jane's face. Her eyes darted to Jane's lips, then back to her eyes - which seemed to light up in wonder.

The tiniest of nods. An angling of the head.

Their lips met. This time, Maura took the lead, and Jane acquiesced. One hand moved to the back of Jane's head, fingers sliding through those glorious dark tresses, cradling her. The other slid to her waist, tenderly pulling Jane just a tiny bit closer.

Jane instinctively lifted a hand to caress Maura's face. Her head was filling with the taste, scent and feel of Maura. She had never been so...elated. She tried to stifle a moan.

Hearing the check in Jane's breathing, Maura slowly released her. She had to be mindful of Jane's injuries, even if the detective was wont to forget them in the moment.

Jane dropped her hand, fingertips trailing languidly over Maura's throat. They traced her clavicle to where it met her shoulder, and glided down her arm to lightly grasp her wrist.

Maura's hand caught Jane's as it fell. She gripped the detective's forearm, anchoring her.

Jane lowered her gaze and brought her forehead to rest against Maura's collarbone. Tried to catch her breath. Tried to ignore the pain spreading across her side.

Maura stroked her hair for a moment.

"I don't deserve you," Jane whimpered, and began to sob in earnest.

Maura slid closer and gathered Jane to her chest. "It's not about one person deserving another, sweet girl." She kissed the side of Jane's head. "It's…about letting ourselves love each other. Don't you think that makes more sense?"

She felt Jane nod against her shoulder. Felt her tilt her head. Felt Jane tenderly but deliberately press her lips low on her throat. Heard the rasp of her tired voice. "Okay."

Maura pulled back. "Okay?"

Jane wiped her eyes with one hand, but continued to grip Maura's arm with the other. "Okay, I'll…" she smiled through her tears. "I'll be your lost cause. I _am _your lost cause."

Maura allowed herself a soft laugh of pure joy.


	35. Chapter 35

Pain medication and exhaustion finally took their toll on Jane, and Maura found herself content to stay on her couch with a collection of Dickinson poetry and a critical theory article about post-modern feminist readings of the American poet. She found in her youth that she identified with Emily Dickinson, and though her perspectives and tastes had evolved over the years, she found she still appreciated the reclusive poet's work for what it was. She turned a page, and her focus drifted from nineteenth century verse to the motionless detective asleep in her lap.

The hand not holding her literature was buried in the dense, dark curls of Jane's hair. Aside from the simple happiness she felt at such contact with her beloved best friend, Maura marveled at the texture of the midnight locks between her fingers. She sifted through Jane's hair, thinking. From a distance, Jane's hair looked coarse and unruly - not unlike Maura's first impressions of Jane all those years ago. But to feel it now beneath her hand, Maura reveled in its rich softness. Yes, the natural curls gave it a propensity to tangle, but once the tangles were tamed, they gave way to lengths of silken smoothness.

Just like Jane. If one was brave and determined enough to push past the gruff barriers of Jane's snide remarks and biting sarcasm, there was a gentle, compassionate, and deeply loyal soul to be found underneath. That was quite possibly Maura's favorite aspect of Jane's character. It made her feel privileged to know the person Jane was when her guard was completely down.

Jane let out a tiny sigh - presumably of contentment - but otherwise did not stir or wake.

_She's genuinely relaxed, _Maura thought, and smiled. Her insides warmed. She softly massaged Jane's scalp and continued to stroke her hair. She realized that if they had stayed like that for the rest of the night, she would have no complaints.

Jane sighed again. Her hand twitched where it rested on Maura's knee.

Maura observed what she could see of Jane's profile. A frown began to brew as dark brows pressed together. Slow even breaths quickened and became erratic. Jaw muscles quivered as she began to clench her teeth. Jane drew her right elbow back slowly, instinctively covering her injured side with her forearm.

Maura slid two fingers to Jane's throat, just below her jaw. She pressed lightly until she felt the pulse. Her eyes narrowed. The pace was steady, but increasing. She was loath, as always, to disturb Jane's rest, but she feared the detective might cause herself more pain if she bore the onslaught of a violent nightmare like those she was prone to.

She moved her hand to the back of Jane's neck first, kneading gently, feeling the tension gathering there. "Jane." Then she slid her palm down between Jane's shoulder blades, rubbing softly.

Jane's whole body jerked and she inhaled sharply. Her eyes snapped open, and she rolled over, looking at Maura.

"Are you okay?" Maura's hand moved, of its own volition, to cover Jane's injured side.

Jane closed her eyes and covered them with her hand. "Sorry. I just remembered I need to call Frost's mom."

Maura tilted her head.

Jane uncovered her eyes and looked at her. "To tell her we caught Ruiz. What time is it?" Her voice was rough with sleep.

Maura checked her phone. "Time for another round of pain medication. You can call her in the morning."

Jane sat up slowly, Maura gripping her arm to support her. "I promised her I'd catch him. That I'd do everything I could."

"And you have."

Jane sat hunched on the edge of the couch cushion. "I just feel like I owe her that phone call." She looked at Maura. "Seriously, what time is it?"

"It's almost nine."

"Mmm...you're probably right. Don't want to bug her this late. " She took Maura's hand and kissed it. "Remind me first thing in the morning?"

"Are you planning on going to work tomorrow?" Maura stood and went to the kitchen to retrieve a pain pill and something for Jane to wash it down with.

Jane smirked. "That's a bit of a loaded question, isn't it? How much trouble would I be in if I said yes?"

"Jane..." She handed Jane a glass of water and the pill.

"Okay, how about this - am I _allowed _to go to work tomorrow, Doctor Isles?" Jane knocked back the medication with a quick gulp of water.

Maura heaved an exasperated sigh. "I suppose I don't see how I could stop you. Besides, you are an independent adult woman. It isn't within my power to allow you to do anything."

Jane did a little fist pump. "Yes!"

Maura picked up her phone and opened her email app. "It is, however, in Lieutenant Cavanaugh's power to allow you to work...or not, as the case may be." She gave Jane a once-over with her eyes, taking care to linger over the vicinity of her ribcage.

Jane looked at her askance. "I don't like how much satisfaction you're taking in this."

Maura's eyes grew steely. "Jane, you were hit by a _car _today. And before that you were almost shot. Again." She began searching her contact list as her voice faltered. "What I _don't _take satisfaction in is the prospect of losing you again. We've only just come to this place of...mutual understanding...I only just got you back!" Maura located the lieutenant in her contacts and began typing.

"Mauraaaaa! Stop! What're you doing?" She made a weak grab for the phone, which the medical examiner easily dodged. "Don't make me stay home. Please. I have to see this through."

Maura's forehead creased in sympathy. But she shook her head.

Jane's expression grew desperate. "Maura. Please. I'm begging you. Let me go in tomorrow. Even...even if it's just desk duty."

She stopped typing and lowered her phone. "Promise me you will not budge from that chair all day."

"Except for lunch and coffee breaks."

Maura rolled her eyes. "I'm not going to make you starve. Now, promise me."

"Cross my heart and-"

"Do _not _finish that sentence," Maura commanded fiercely. "Of all the ways in which you could phrase a promise, you picked that one?"

"Didn't realize that was such a sensitive subject."

"Jane..." the edge in her voice was telling. Maura was tired, too. Her normal abundance of patience was waning fast.

"Okay...fine. 'I promise.' How's that?" She flopped back against the couch and closed her eyes. Unconsciousness was becoming more appealing by the second.

Maura relaxed. "I will accept that. Was that so hard?"

"Not as hard as it's gonna be to ride a desk and shuffle paper for eight straight hours," Jane muttered darkly.

"Oh Jane, stop with the melodramatics."

She received a petulant glare in reply.

"I'll make you a deal." She stood and held out her hand to Jane. The detective took it and allowed herself to be helped to her feet. "If you're good, and you stay at your desk like I tell you to, after lunch you can come downstairs with me."

"Ooh goody...chillin' with the corpses. Yayyy."

Maura laughed and linked their arms, moving in the direction of the bedroom. "Only if you're good. Nice pun, by the way."

"Thank you for noticing."

Pre-set phone alarms jarred them from sleep at six a.m. the next morning. Jane groaned in aggravation. She swiped blindly at her phone's screen to silence the din her device was making. Finally obtaining the quiet she longed for, she sluggishly rolled over, groaning again with regret as pressure from the mattress send stabbing pain through her fractured ribs.

"Hang on Jane. Try not to move." Maura quickly slid off her side of the bed and hustled out the door.

"No problem," Jane rasped.

Maura returned momentarily with the morning's dose of pain medication, a glass of water, and a banana. She had been gone all of sixty seconds, but to Jane it had felt much longer. Pain - and the subsequent tension throughout her body - had her shaking. She did her best to sit up enough to take a couple of swallows of water.

Jane eyed the fruit while she accepted the meds and water. "You know I can't eat this early in the morning."

Maura nodded, brow deeply furrowed in concern. Her best friend's shallow breathing, and the shudders that wracked her body, did not escape her notice. "Just try for me. Even if you can only eat half, you'll be glad for your lack of gastric discomfort later."

Jane swallowed the medication and took a bite of the banana, willing the tremors to subside. She managed to shakily rotate her body so she was sitting on the edge of the bed.

Maura joined her, sitting down on her uninjured side.

"How did you sleep last night?" Jane asked ruefully.

"I've had better nights," Maura said. She shrugged. "I was just worried about you."

Jane rubbed her shoulder. "Maura, I'm sorry." She pulled her in and kissed the side of her head. "You know I appreciate you, right? Because I do."

Maura nodded, placing her hand on Jane's leg.

Jane turned Maura's chin gently and kissed her. "I love you." She kissed her again, slowly. She felt it of the utmost importance that she conveyed to Maura how much she was loved.

Maura's arm wrapped around her lower back; she clutched a fistful of Jane's t-shirt.

Jane slowed them to a stop as her ribs began to flare up. She cupped Maura's cheek as she pulled away, thumb brushing lightly across her cheek. Maura leaned into her scarred palm.

Their gazes seemed to melt into each other, or so it felt to Jane. She sighed, shaking her head.

"What is it?"

"It's just...it's so surreal." Her voice was soft, warm.

It made Maura's heart flutter. "What?"

"Getting to do this. To wake up next to you, to kiss you just because I can and I want to. When I'd convinced myself for so many years that it was impossible." Another shudder passed through her, and her fractured ribs twinged. She winced.

"Are you sure you want to go in today?" Maura asked, voice grave.

Jane gave a wry smile. "You're gonna give yourself an ulcer if you keep worrying about me like this."

Maura threw up her hands. "Well, I'm sorry but I can't help it, Jane!"

Jane winced again and clutched her side. "These meds better be quick this morning." She met Maura's fretful gaze. She was startled by the heat she saw there. "Frankly, I don't _want _to go in and do paperwork all day. I'm not looking forward to being confined to a desk."

Maura's expression brightened, no doubt with the hope that desk duty would deter Jane from leaving bed at all.

"But I _am _looking forward to wrapping this case up. We'll have all the evidence compiled, categorized and catalogued in prep for court. I refuse to let this guy walk on a technicality." She slowly rose from the bed, grabbing her phone off the nightstand. "Korsak, it's me. Can you get me Frost's mom's phone number please?" Maura watched her shuffle to the kitchen. Heard her root around for paper and pen. "Oh...you did? Thanks for doing that, but - well, I thought that was my job. I wanted to...No, it's okay...What's that? She is? Oh...then I guess I'll see her then...yeah...okay...Thanks, bye."

She returned to the bedroom, finding Maura where she'd left her, sitting on the edge of the bed.

"You okay?" Maura had been watching her with such intensity, and now wouldn't meet her eyes. Jane slid her hand delicately through warm blonde hair. Glided her hand down her arm.

Maura looked up at her, hazel eyes full of such melancholy Jane felt her breath catch in her throat. "I was thinking about Frost yesterday. A lot. I'm not sure why." She frowned.

"You miss him." It wasn't a question.

Maura nodded. "I know he was your partner, and I work with all detectives from all units, but he - I just -"

"You don't have to play it down, Maura. Just because he was my partner doesn't mean that you would or should miss him any less than I do. He was your friend just as much as mine. Hell, he was family. To all of us." She gave a sad smile of reassurance.

Maura nodded again. Her chest filled with warmth to see how far Jane had come. "I've accepted that he's gone. But I still miss him when he's not around and he normally would be."

Jane looked down. A lump was forming in her throat. "I think we're going to be feeling that way for a while. Maybe a long time. You lose somebody and you eventually think you're over it, but then something out of nowhere will remind you...and you'll miss them."

"I don't think I'll ever not miss him."

Jane shook her head. "Me neither." She kissed the top of Maura's head. "Nor should we."


	36. Chapter 36

**A/N: As you continue to be good to this story, it continues to flow. This chapter might jerk a few tears - if I'm doing this right. ;)**

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Jane returned her desk phone receiver to its cradle. "DA confirms Dominic has agreed to testify in court against Ruiz."

"That's good news!" Korsak said. "I think you made an impression on him."

"I think what he saw in that alley made an impression on him," Jane replied. She sighed heavily and propped elbow on desk, chin on fist.

"What was that for?" Korsak asked, hanging up his desk phone and looking up from his computer.

Jane groaned and rubbed at her face. "I'm bored!"

"And whose fault is that?"

She jammed an index finger down on the desk. "Maura and Cavanaugh have both made it _very _clear that I am not to leave this desk today. The only thing I'm missing is a ball and chain." She threw her hands up in exasperation.

Korsak chortled. "I gotta say, I'm in their corner on this one. You've had enough excitement in the past twelve hours. And it serves you right for scaring us as badly as you did yesterday."

Jane rolled her eyes. "Oh Korsak, you know me - adrenaline junkie that I am - I can never get _enough _excitement." She fidgeted for a moment, wiggling her mouse and drumming her fingers on her desk. "That's it. I gotta go get some coffee or something." She pushed away from her desk and stood.

Korsak lifted his receiver again and dialed another number. He cocked a suspicious eyebrow at her.

"Oh, come on, Vince! I just need some air is all."

He shrugged. "Open a window."

She stared indignantly at him. "Really?"

"I just know Maura will be none too pleased if she finds out you left your desk when you promised you wouldn't. Not to mention your mother. And the lieutenant."

Jane started for the elevator doors. "Well how are any of them gonna know unless you rat me out?" She hammered the "down" button with her finger. It replied promptly with a ding. "Besides, Maura said coffee breaks don't count." The doors slid open.

As if conjured by Jane's words, Maura - garbed in a fitted, black and red colorblock dress - stepped out holding two lidded to-go cups from the Division One Cafe.

Jane's jaw dropped. The sight of her best friend dealt a solid, one-two punch to her composure.

Maura, materializing like a genie, bringing her coffee just when she'd been threatening to go on a quest to get it herself.

Maura, with her color coordination and endearing smile...and her perfect body.

Recovering just enough to keep her head from spinning off her shoulders, Jane tamped down the sudden, intense wave of desire that had just assailed her every sense. "How did you...?" She backpedaled and looked at Korsak incredulously. The sergeant was just hanging up his desk phone, looking guilty.

Maura held out one of the cups to Jane, redirecting her attention. "I thought you might be wanting this right about now," she said sweetly. She cupped Jane's elbow and guided the still-reeling detective back to her desk.

"Traitor," Jane growled at Korsak over her shoulder. She went willingly back to her desk with Maura at her side, but she refused to sit down.

"How are things going?" Maura asked conspicuously. She smiled.

Jane glared at Korsak. "I should think you have a pretty good idea of how things are going, seeing as you've hired your own personal mole up here to keep an eye on me."

"May I remind you that I've been married three times; I am immune to passive aggressive." Korsak said.

"What did she promise you?" Jane demanded.

Maura laughed at them. "Jane, you know both Korsak and me better than that." She flashed a winning, conspiratorial grin at the sergeant. "No bribe was necessary; our mutual concern for your well-being was motivation enough." Then she took a tiny step closer to Jane, her expression sobering. "How are you feeling?" she asked in a low voice. Her hand returned to Jane's elbow and her gaze flickered downward to Jane's side for a nanosecond.

Jane sipped her coffee and shrugged. She wrapped both hands around the heat of the cup. "Not terrible enough to call it quits and go home. If that's what you're asking." Heat flashed through her when she registered Maura's thumb gently stroking her arm through the sleeve of her blazer. She made herself meet Maura's eyes. Folded her arms so her fingertips grazed Maura's at the crook of her elbow. "I'm okay. Really. Just..." she huffed a sigh, "antsy."

Maura smiled and stepped away. "Just a couple more hours until lunch," she said. "I'll let this escape attempt slide. If you can stay here until lunch, I'll come get you and we'll go someplace fun." She headed back to the elevator, her own coffee still in hand.

Jane looked doubtful, almost petulant.

"And then after that I should have some things for you to take a look at downstairs." She touched the down button once.

Jane brightened slightly at the prospect of new developments.

The elevators doors dinged open again. "In the meantime, enjoy your coffee. Oh! Excuse me." A uniformed officer escorted a woman out of the elevator just as Maura stepped inside.

"Thank you," Jane said as Maura gave her a little wave between the closing doors.

Korsak stood from his desk.

Camille Frost was now standing in the middle of the bullpen.

Jane stood transfixed for a moment, all thoughts of Maura and coffee forgotten. She was seeing so much of her fallen partner in the woman before them. She was seeing him the way he used to look after a long, hard case that had worn them all down to the barest threads of their fortitude. The softness around the eyes, the mouth drawn in at the corners, the tiniest of creases between the brows. The little furrows that would line his forehead.

The familiarity filled her with a longing so intense that her throat seemed to close around it. She tried to swallow. She was overwhelmed with the urge to throw her arms around this woman and tell her how sorry she was that nothing they could do would bring Barry back. But she couldn't speak.

"Mrs. Frost," Korsak said. "Thank you for coming in to see us."

"Please, call me Camille," she said. Her inflection even echoed the way her son spoke.

They both nodded.

"I wanted to come and thank you personally - face to face - for what you did for my son."

Here Jane realized that Camille was holding a beautiful bouquet of roses in all colors. She proffered them to the detective. "Please, Camille, I can't accept - I did what any of us would've done. Frost would," her voice caught, and she let out a shaky breath, "he would've done the exact same thing had it been one of us."

Camille's eyes were downcast. "I know you loved him like a brother. You never had to say it; I could just tell." She raised her eyes to meet Jane's. "And I know that you think that what you did was not enough." She looked at Korsak, too. "But as a mother, I can tell you that it most certainly was." She pressed the flowers into Jane's hands, and a tear escaped down the detective's cheek. "You made me a promise at Barry's funeral, Detective Rizzoli. You may not even remember. But you said - you promised - you would do everything you could to find who killed my son and make him pay. I never doubted that you meant what you said. And then you poured yourself - everything you had - into finding him. And you did. You finished the job." She took a deep breath. A smile dawned on her dark face. "So I wanted to come thank you. All of you, from the bottom of my heart. And I wanted to tell you, " she took Jane's hand, "you are _enough. _You are _more _than enough. And I'm so proud that Barry had people like you to call his friends."

Jane wiped her eyes with her free hand, smiling through her tears.

The elevator dinged again behind them. Another officer escorted another woman out of the elevator. She was carrying an armload of bouquets similar to Jane's. "My wife was kind enough to carry the rest of the flowers up," Camille said. She pointed them out - each designated with a personalized card - as her wife set them down on Korsak's desk. "There's a little something for each of you in the card. There's one for Detective Martinez; Sergeant Korsak, here's yours; one for Detective Frankie Rizzoli; and Detective," she held one more out to Jane, "this one is for your medical examiner, Dr. Isles? I understand you two are quite close and thought you could take these to her?"

"Oh thank you, she will love them so much but...would you like to take them to her in her office? I can show you..."

"We'd love to but we wouldn't want to intrude. I know you're all so busy and we've already taken up so much of your time. And I have an appointment after this, sadly. Please, give her my thanks and love - and my apologies for not being able to stop by."

Jane nodded. "I know she'll understand. Thank you so much for thinking of us."

"Yes, thank you," Korsak echoed, his voice subdued by emotion.

"No, detectives. Thank _you. _What you've done, what you've sacrificed, means the world to me." She stepped up to Korsak and hugged him. She said something in his ear and he nodded with a smile. Then she turned to Jane and embraced her. "I couldn't be more proud of you if you were my own daughter," she said so only Jane could hear.

Jane swallowed thickly as she watched them leave.

"You can see where he got his sensitivity from," Korsak remarked quietly.

"Yeah." Jane fingered the petals of a pale pink rose, deep in thought.

"If you want to run those down to Maura real quick, I can make an exception to the ball and chain clause. I'll dole out the ones up here."

Jane gave him a watery smile. "Thanks, Vince."

* * *

**A/N: Some SERIOUS Rizzles incoming in the next chapter or two. I mean to reward your patience. Thank you, as always, for reading, and a special thank you to those who have been sticking with this for the long haul: polotiz, Fenway03, D3nsei, cjunited38, IsaBabisa, j9tigger,coolbyrne, rehellams, magrat70, Dare2speed, IncendioVerum...I see your reviews regularly in my inbox, and though I've been truly lousy with responding to you all, please know that I read what you have to say, I take your feedback into consideration, and I get a little giddy when I see you staying with my stuff for yet another chapter. I felt the need to give you all a shoutout. You mean the world to me. Truly.**


	37. Chapter 37

Maura couldn't stop smiling as she sat in her office, reviewing autopsy reports and answering emails.

Jane was incorrigible, and it never failed to fill Maura with a warmth of affection she had never felt for anyone else. She knew she certainly didn't know anyone as well as she knew the detective. She knew Jane down to the precise moment that she'd try to leave her desk, too restless to spend another moment completing reports and soliciting statements.

Her phone buzzed near her hand. A text from Jane.

_"Is it lunchtime yet"_

Then, seconds later, _"Office or morgue"_

_I'm in my office right now. _She debated reprimanding her detective for leaving her desk yet again, but she'd known that the coffee would only mollify Jane for so long. Besides, in looking at the time, Maura decided they could stand to leave for lunch now.

_"K be right over. I have something for you"_

Maura shivered involuntarily. She couldn't imagine what Jane would possibly bring her that she could obtain in the short span of time between Maura delivering her coffee and receiving her text. And Korsak hadn't called again to inform her that Jane was violating the terms of their informal agreement. Maura smirked and shook her head. The occasional variable in Jane's behavior patterns was what made their relationship all the more interesting.

Jane preceded her entry into Maura's office with a soft knock on the doorjamb.

Maura looked up.

"Hey." Jane swept up the rose bouquet for Maura to behold.

"You visited a florist?" Maura came around her desk to meet Jane.

Jane gave a quiet chuckle. "Frost's mom came by to thank us personally," she said softly, handing the flowers to Maura. "She said there was something in the cards for each of us. She...wanted to bring them up to you herself, but she had an appointment to go to."

Maura pulled a spare vase out of one of the low cabinets along the wall of her office. "I'll just get some water for these." She touched Jane's arm as she passed, and the detective's hand came up to meet her fingertips.

When she returned and placed the flowers in the water, she turned to Jane, observing her face carefully. The detective was standing exactly where Maura had left her, staring at an undefined point on Maura's desk. Her hands clasped each other at her waist.

"You okay?" Maura asked quietly.

Jane blinked and shook herself. "Yeah. Yeah, I was just..." she sighed, "just thinking about Frost. You know." She met Maura's gaze.

Maura nodded. She could see unshed tears brimming in Jane's eyes.

"He looked a lot like his mom. I, uh...I could see a lot of him in her, when she came to us." She wrung her hands and looked away. "It just...made me wish he was here."

Maura wordlessly reached out and wrapped her hand around Jane's forearm. She applied just enough pressure to draw Jane closer. In the span of a breath, she found herself enveloped in Jane's arms, Jane's shoulder tucked just beneath her chin.

Jane's hands slid down to the small of her back then back up, gliding slowly along her spine. She turned her nose into Maura's hair and sighed deeply. "I mailed the divorce papers today."

Maura tightened her hold on the detective in response. Her pulse quickened at Jane's gentle touch. She lifted her hand slowly, curious, and brought it to rest against Jane's chest, above her heart. She felt a similar acceleration in Jane's heart rate. Her thumb brushed over the delicate, sensitive skin over Jane's clavicle. She was rewarded with a soft gasp from the detective.

Jane pulled back to look at her, Maura's hand still over her heart. The detective's eyes crinkled at the corners as she smiled warmly at Maura. She took Maura's face in both her hands, fingers weaving through sleek, gold locks. "God, you're gorgeous," she rasped.

Maura smiled and dipped her head. "Jane."

Jane lifted her chin back up. "No. You are. I can't believe I'm saying this out loud, but I want to wake up to you - to this," she lightly brushed Maura's cheek with the backs of her fingers, "every day."

"I have no objections to that," Maura said, unable to keep from trembling.

"Good." Jane captured Maura's lips with her own, tasting her, breathing her in. They both melted. Jane laughed softly, shaking her head as they pulled apart. "Objections. You goof." She turned to the door, one hand anchored at the small of Maura's back. "C'mon. Let's get food."

Maura slipped behind her desk to retrieve her purse, then returned promptly to Jane's side. "What's wrong with the word 'objections'?"

"Nothing. I just find your use of vocabulary adorable. I have no objections to the word 'objections'." She let Maura pass through the door ahead of her.

"You're ridiculous."

"But I love you," Jane said quietly, with a smile.

"Yes." Maura took her arm, falling in step with her as they walked down the hall. "And nothing is more important to me than that."

* * *

"Do you think we're starting this too soon?" Jane blurted the question, as if unable to contain it any longer.

They'd spent the evening discussing their impending court case against Ruiz at length. The entire precinct, it seemed, was determined that the man would suffer the consequences of his actions to the full extent of the law. When they had exhausted all talk of evidence and witnesses and arguments, a lull had settled between the women and their words. Maura set down her beer bottle on the kitchen island, eyes intent on her best friend.

Jane was sitting at the breakfast bar across from her, worrying the edges of the label on her own bottle with her fingernails. Her eyes danced from the label, to Maura, to the fridge, and back to the label. Finally, she met Maura's gaze again. "I guess I should be asking, 'Do you think _I'm _starting this too soon?'" She bit her lip.

"You're referring to us entering into a romantic relationship?"

Jane nodded.

"In the context of your divorce, I think you know where I stand on the subject. We've talked about it enough to come to a mutual understanding; we both want this. The timing is what it is - not ideal, but the circumstances were generated by choices that cannot be unmade."

The deepening furrows in Jane's brow indicated she was less than satisfied with that answer.

Maura stepped around the island to sit on the barstool next to Jane. She reached up to smooth away the creases, and smiled when Jane closed her eyes and leaned into the caress. "Selfishly, I don't think we started soon enough. That can't be helped either," she drew her fingertips lightly down Jane's temple, "but I'm determined to make the most of what we have now." Jane opened her eyes. Maura could see apprehension still lingering there behind those mahogany irises. "To live in the present."

"But...objectively speaking...I don't want you or anyone else to think that I was too quick to jump from a marriage - to a man I've known since high school - to a dating relationship with my female coworker and best friend...and for myself, I don't know if maybe I should've taken more time to let the dust settle before I dragged you into my drama..."

It was Maura's turn to frown.

Jane swiftly took both of her hands and held them tightly. "Don't get me wrong! I love us. I still can't believe that something I thought would never happen has become my beautiful reality. But objectively - I know its stupid, but - I guess I'm just afraid of how it looks. And I don't want to rush things, but I also don't want to put off what we've both been feeling - I think you're right that we've waited long enough, but...I'm ending it with Casey after such a short time. And diving in with you right after. I guess I'm still a little confused - at myself, really." She shrugged helplessly. "I don't know how else to explain it."

"Okay." Maura rotated her barstool to face Jane more directly. "This is important." She held Jane's gaze just like she held her hands - gently but firmly. "Are you happy, Jane? Really? Right now, in this moment. Be honest."

"Yes," Jane whispered fervently. "Yes."

"And the people who love you, whom you trust - those whose opinions mean the most to you - they've told you what they think about your divorce, yes? Frankie, Angela, Korsak - you have their full and unwavering support."

Jane nodded. This was not news to her. Yet her doubts clung to her mind, swirled in her gut.

_How ironic, _Maura thought. _All the time and energy Jane has spent bolstering my confidence in who I am...who would have thought that - in a romantic relationship - I'd be the one reassuring her? _All of that brash confidence and devil-may-care independence was nowhere to be found. This was the Jane for whom Maura had stayed up all night when Hoyt returned. This was the Jane Maura knew she would swear to protect for as long as she was able. She took a breath and locked eyes with the detective, demonstrating that she was unafraid.

"Do you trust me?"

A nod. "With my life," she whispered again.

Maura paused a moment, struck by the raw frankness of Jane's expression. She'd known this woman would give her anything. She hadn't expected Jane would give her everything.

She swallowed happy tears. Took another breath. "Jane Rizzoli does not care what anyone thinks beyond the people she truly loves." She smiled. "Jane Rizzoli does what she wants and what she thinks is best. No one can tell her otherwise. And when it comes to the people she loves, nothing can come between her and them." She reached up and tucked an errant strand of onyx behind Jane's ear. "She is unstoppable. That is one of the many things I have always loved about her.

"So if you're honestly not ready to do this yet, I understand. And I will wait. I promise. But I refuse to let you retreat because a little public opinion made you nervous. Your mother didn't raise a pansy."

Jane's eyes flew wide, taking in the fierce, hazel orbs before her. "Are you calling me a pansy? Did Doctor Isles just call _me _a pansy?!"

Maura laughed, squeezing her hands. "Sometimes you are far too easy to rile-"

Jane severed the end of that sentence from Maura's lips before it could reach the air. She sealed Maura's mouth with her own, feeling a fierce joy when her beloved's eyes fluttered shut and one hand came up to grip Jane's bicep. "Pansy this," Jane murmured when they broke apart, gasping. Their mouths came together again, and Jane's lips began an exploration, wandering down from Maura's mouth to the edge of her jaw, trailing to where it reached her ear, then down again along the column of her trachea, hearing the wind of Maura's breath raking through her throat, feeling the hot pulse fluttering just beneath the skin. She paused just above Maura's collarbone, resting her lips there and feeling the rise and fall of the medical examiner's chest.

Maura's hand had moved into her hair, fingers kneading and combing across the back of her skull. "Remind me to call you a pansy more often," Maura said, her voice rough and dark.

Jane raised her head to look her in the eyes. Hazel infused into chocolate, and all train of thought was momentarily lost, suspended between their eyes. "Are you sure you can handle the consequences if you do?" She quirked a brow, a smirk ghosting across her lips, dimples just beginning to show. She moved in, fingertips tracing Maura's jaw, seeking Maura's lips again...when she felt her ribs spasm painfully. She winced, and Maura grabbed her shoulder, both stopping and supporting her.

Maura slowly placed each hand on either side of Jane's face. "I suppose we'll just have to find out when it happens." She bit her lip and her eyes flicked down to Jane's before returning the detective's stare. She leaned in slowly, bringing Jane's face closer with her hands. She pressed her lips tenderly to Jane's forehead, then her cheek just below the eye, then the tip of her nose. One hand left Jane's face to capture her hand and bring it to her lips. There were scrapes on the heel of her hand from when she was hit by the car, and a nasty graze on the outside of her wrist that was just beginning to heal. Maura kissed the injuries lightly, taking her time with each one.

Jane trembled. Held her breath. Failed to suppress a whimper as wave after wave of emotion washed over her in a tidal flood. Maura was done reasoning with Jane's mind with words.

Now she was speaking to her heart with touch.

Maura released her hand and finally kissed her lips, rising as she did so. Soon, Jane was looking up at her with soulful dark eyes and a wistful expression that made Maura's heart ache. Jane's hands were at her waist, her knees on either side of Maura's hips. Maura pulled her in, bringing Jane's head to her chest, her fingers once more entangling themselves in Jane's gorgeous hair.

Long, lean arms came around her waist. Hands clutched at her back, fingertips curling slightly at the edges of her shoulder blades.

They sighed as one.

Maura honestly couldn't remember the last time Jane had clung to her like this. She hadn't realized, until now, the full extent of how much she had missed it.

* * *

**A/N: I poured myself into this chapter. I felt like I NEEDED to write it. And if this chapter makes you happy, that happiness is well-deserved, because you've made me SO happy about writing this story with all your support and reviews, and your involvement with the characters and the plot.**


	38. Chapter 38

Ruiz's trial had a good portion of the Boston populace on edge.

Even before the actual trial proceedings began, the legal battle between the district attorney's office and the lawyers Ruiz had hired to defend him had been fierce. Ruiz's legal team did everything they could to delay the proceedings, while Governor Roman leaned heavily on the DA to speed things up as much as possible.

Ultimately, the DA and the governor won out, managing to push the trial date forward to only a month and a half from the date of his arrest, as opposed to the original four-month window that was scheduled.

On the day the district attorney was planning to call Maura to the stand, Jane suffered from an intense bout of secondhand performance anxiety. She had begun to feel an irrational level of concern for Maura's safety the night before, to the point of insisting that the medical examiner spend the night in her little brownstone rather than at the house. "We can't be too careful," she reasoned.

Maura humored her, but insisted it was going to be fine.

Stepping up to the courtroom doors now, Jane's anxiety redoubled, and despite her best efforts to stay calm and in control, her hand found the small of Maura's back beneath her blazer, fingers tense against the fabric of her blouse. Her frantic heartrate slowed at the contact. Maura flicked a glance over her shoulder at the detective, and her reassuring smile provided Jane with that temporary dose of calm that she sorely needed.

"Looks like he got what he wanted after all," Korsak remarked as they entered the courtroom.

Jane spied Ruiz in his orange jumpsuit, flanked by his attorneys in the row of seating closest to the bench. He looked fairly relaxed, comfortable even, though she knew he was handcuffed. "How do you figure?"

"Notoriety," Maura said from the other side of her. "Media attention. He wanted everyone to know his story."

"Well," Jane said, looking over her shoulder at the swarm of reporters and photographers clamoring just outside the courtroom doors, "they're going to get _a _story. Not entirely sure it'll be the one he wanted." She watched Maura closely as they slid into their seats. "You good?" she murmured.

Maura nodded. Her hands were clasped tightly in her lap, her back ramrod straight. No doubt she was mentally reciting her responses to the lawyers' bombardment of questions.

The judge arrived, and they all stood. Order was promptly called, and the day's trial proceedings began.

"Prosecution calls the Chief Medical Examiner of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Doctor Maura Isles, to the stand."

Maura rose, was sworn in, and took her seat on the witness stand.

Difficult as it was to be in Ruiz's presence in court, Jane was grateful that he wasn't some sadistic butcher who mutilated his victims like some of the other perps they'd put away in the past. It was enough of a struggle to watch Maura have to revisit routine autopsy photographs she'd taken of Frost from atop the witness stand. Like an automated recording, she recited cause of death for each of Ruiz's victims, as well as choice details from her findings when prompted by an attorney. Her face remained a mask of polished professionalism, devoid of warmth or feeling. She was here to perform a very specific task, and she performed it with meticulous concision, as was her custom. Her expertise, coupled with firsthand witness accounts, made for a damning testimony against Ruiz.

But despite the efficiency with which she did her duty, Jane knew the toll it was taking on her.

She knew what it was like to have to look into the eyes of yet another vindictive bastard with a screw loose and explain to the court - in devastating detail - who he had murdered and precisely how he had gone about it.

She hated the way Ruiz watched Maura while she testified. How he sat back in his seat and leered at her. Especially during cross-examination by the defense. For the most part, Maura was able to keep her eyes on the attorney and ignore the blatant staring of the defendant. But every so often, Jane would catch her hazel eyes flickering to Ruiz and away. Each glance made the tension in her body increase. The heat of suppressed anger made her itch.

At long last, Ruiz's defense attorney returned to his table and said, "No further questions, Your Honor."

The judge dismissed Maura from the witness stand and called for a recess.

/

They sat down for a quick lunch at a cafe just down the street from the courthouse. "If I'm hovering too much and it's irritating at all, please tell me," Jane said.

Maura had been quiet all day, and took her time in replying. Normally, Jane would have become impatient and anxious - fearing Maura's hesitation was due to her concern that Jane would not like her answer. But over the years, Jane's natural empathetic intuition had keyed her in to the subtle nuances of Maura's emotional processes. She had developed a brand of patience that was specific only to Maura-related things, and a powerful instinct for the exact moments when this kind of patience was required.

And given the fact that she hadn't asked a direct question, she didn't expect Maura to have a ready-made response for her. Maura would understand the rhetorical comment for what it was - an open door.

"Honey?" With her voice she coaxed Maura's eyes up to meet her own. "You did good."

Maura sighed. "Well. 'You did _well._'" She set down her sandwich and reached for Jane's hand. The detective watched her, wondering at how intent she looked.

Rather than holding her hand like she normally would, Maura's fingertips carefully explored the back of Jane's hand; they brushed over her scar with something akin to reverence, traced the delicate filigree of veins and tendons, roamed up to her wrist to encircle the prominent joints there, returned to the back of her hand to lightly caress perpetually scraped knuckles. She turned Jane's hand over then, palm now facing up, and traced the scar there, too. She ended by drawing her fingertips along the undersides of Jane's long, slender fingers and bringing them to rest fingertip to fingertip.

Jane bowed her head. Maura made her feel so many things with such intensity, and she didn't have to say a word.

"I know this court case has been making you feel edgy," Maura said finally. "But you truly do not need to worry about me."

Jane raised her eyes. _But I can't help it, _she thought. She rotated her wrist, turning her hand again so she could hold onto Maura's.

"That being said," Maura added, "I like having you close, knowing that you continue to always have my back." She looked down at their joined hands and smiled. "It's the exact opposite of irritating."

Jane relaxed and sat back, but kept their fingers intertwined. "Was being up on the stand as hard as it was to watch?" She took another bite of her own sandwich.

"I'm sure it was harder for you to watch than it was for me to recite facts," Maura said with the utmost nonchalance.

Jane grinned. "Granted. You are a pro at the recitation of all things factual and scientific. I mean, that's basically what a degree in medicine is, isn't it?"

Maura appeared pensive. "Give or take a few intensive courses in chemistry, pathology, and biology," she shrugged, "and the occasional internship...but essentially, yes, you're right."

They laughed together a moment. Jane ate her last bite of sandwich. Looked at her watch. "We should probably start heading back." She pointed to the uneaten half of Maura's sandwich. "You wanna get that to-go?"

"As opposed to you eating it for me?" Maura quipped.

Jane shrugged. "Well, I mean, that's always an option, but I wanted to give you a chance to call dibs before I snarfed it. But I think you'll be more hungry once court is adjourned for the day and the adrenaline wears off." She stopped a server as they passed by. "Could we get a box for this please?"

"Of course! Be right back with that."

"Thank you." She turned back to Maura. "I don't have the heart to snarf your sandwich. Not today."

Maura blushed unexpectedly. "That's very sweet of you, Jane. That you would refrain from...snarfing...my leftovers."

The server brought back a box, and they promptly packed up Maura's sandwich and headed to the car. Jane's phone rang right as she opened the passenger side door. She recoiled when she looked at the number.

"I'm sorry, Maura, but I should probably take this. Could be divorce stuff." She grimaced.

"Casey?"

Jane nodded. "Sorry."

"It's okay. Go ahead and take it. Get in, though."

Jane obeyed, buckling up while Maura put her Prius in gear. As soon as they started moving, Jane placed her hand on Maura's leg, thumb gently stroking back and forth through her skirt. "Hey," she said into the phone once she accepted the call.

"Hello, Jane."

"Is there something wrong?" She rolled her eyes. Sometimes it was like pulling teeth getting information out of him.

"Not...exactly. I was wondering if...if we could talk."

"Is there more paperwork we need to discuss? Did you forget something at my apartment?"

"No, no...nothing like that. I just...wanted to talk to you. If that was possible."

Jane fell silent for a moment.

Maura looked over, wondering what Casey was saying.

"Casey, are you having second thoughts?"

It was his turn to be silent.

"I can't keep playing this game with you. I'm sorry. When I agreed to the divorce, I made sure I had made up my mind before I said anything."

"Jane, I just-"

"Look. I'd be more than happy to help you out with anything logistically that'll make this go smoother for you, but I can't do this back-and-forth thing anymore."

They pulled up to the courthouse.

"Jane, listen-"

"I'm sorry, Casey. I gotta go. I'm in the middle of a murder trial."

He sighed in resignation. "Okay."

"Bye." She ended the call. Let out a heavy sigh of her own. She looked down and realized Maura had both hands tightly clasped around her own. "Sorry, Maura."

"Why are you apologizing to me? I think you handled that rather well."

"He frustrates the hell outta me. Always has." She rubbed her forehead.

"I know." She leaned across the center console, and Jane met her halfway for a kiss.

As they stepped out of the car, Jane paused to straighten her charcoal grey skirt. "Maura?"

Maura shut her door. "Yes?"

"This seems almost silly," she leaned on the side of the car, "I mean, we spend so much time together as it is, but I'm gonna ask anyway." She stepped around the front of the car and met Maura on the sidewalk, shivering as a swirl of breeze exposed her bare legs to an early autumn chil. "I want to take a couple of days off with you, once this trial is over. And I want to..." she looked down at the pointed toes of her heels, "I'd like to start going on actual dates. With you." She looked up, meeting Maura's steady gaze. "I really want to, and I feel like it's time. Would you...go on a date with me?"

Maura threw her arms around Jane, one coming around her shoulders, the other rising to cup the back of Jane's head, fingers gliding effortlessly through dense, black waves. "Yes," she whispered in Jane's ear, leaning the detective back against the car. She kissed her cheek, then pulled back to look at her. She laughed quietly as Jane sighed in apparent relief. "Of course I will!" Then she pulled a grinning Jane back in for another kiss.

Jane's hands settled in their usual spot at Maura's lower back.

Maura's gripped the lapels of Jane's blazer.

The sound of someone clearing their throat behind them made them pause. Thinking the voice was familiar, Jane released Maura and peered around her.

"Korsak..." she said in a strangled whisper.

The sergeant held up a hand to stop her. "Before you trip all over yourself trying to explain, let me just say: it's not my place to have an opinion, but I think you both made the right call."

Jane was at a loss. "You...?" Her vocabulary abandoned her.

Korsak shook his head. "I don't think anybody ever expected to see this happen, but seeing you two in front of me like this makes more sense than I ever imagined." He chuckled. Looked at his watch. "Better get in there. Don't want to be late for Dominic's testimony." With that, he walked up the steps to the courthouse doors and went inside.

A squeeze at her arm brought Jane's focus back to Maura. Her beloved raised her brows and gave her a smile that said, "_See? That wasn't so bad."_

Jane looked down at her own watch. "No, but seriously, we don't wanna be late!" she said, and hustled them both up the steps.


	39. Chapter 39

"When were you thinking of going out on our first date?" Maura asked, hazel eyes shining as they marched in the courthouse doors to catch up with Korsak.

Startled, Jane shot her a wide-eyed look. "Well, we don't have to plan it right this second, do we? Maybe we should save logistics until-"

Maura took her arm firmly as they made brisk strides down the corridor. "Jane, it's okay. It was more of a rhetorical question." She was grinning.

Jane loved that look of unadulterated enthusiasm.

"It's just something to think about over the next little while. But we'll revisit it after the trial's over."

Jane nodded, reassured. She opened the door for Maura when the reached the right courtroom. Everyone inside was still getting settled. Court was not yet in session.

/

The defense called Ruiz's daughter's mother to the stand, but she made for a weak character witness. Jane could tell her heart wasn't in it. The assistant DA - a young woman, full of fire and conviction - poked all manner of holes in her testimony during cross-examination. It took all of Jane's willpower to resist the urge to cheer when the prosecuting attorney said, "No further questions, Your Honor," and returned to her seat.

Next, the prosecution called Dominic Adams to the stand. Jane sat up straighter as he stepped up, another, milder bout of secondhand nerves causing an uneasy stirring in her gut. The bailiff swore him in, and again the assistant DA began her line of questioning, establishing his presence as a bystander at the scene of Kendra Roman's murder, his reasons for being there, and his connection to the victim.

When it was the defense attorney's turn, his questions began in much the same way. "Under what circumstances did your meeting with Miss Roman take place on the night of her death?"

Dominic cleared his throat, and his voice quavered slightly when he spoke. "I was walking by and she stepped out of the club for a - to smoke a cigarette, and we started talking."

"So you just..._happened _to be walking by when she stepped out?"

"Yes." Dominic swallowed, and searched the courtroom, presumably for a friendly face. He found Jane, and she gave him a slight nod. The air began to stir with uneasy murmurings from those present in the courtroom.

"Under what circumstances had you last seen Miss Roman? Prior to the evening of her death."

"I, uh...might've been just after we graduated high school. I'm not really sure. I feel like it'd been a while."

The defense attorney began to pace slowly before the bench. "And how did she seem to you at the time? Do you recall? She was already struggling with addiction by her senior year, was she not?"

"Objection, Your Honor." The assistant DA rose abruptly from her seat, making Maura jump beside Jane. "Leading question."

The judge tilted her head. "Sustained." She looked to the defense attorney. "I suggest you redirect your line of questioning, counsel."

The defense attorney nodded and turned to Dominic. "Back to the night in question." He smiled. "Mr. Adams, would you say that alley where you encountered Miss Roman was an area that you frequented?"

Dominic frowned. "I don't really hang out in alleys much, no..."

"But that alley in particular - had you passed through there before?"

"Yes...it's a kind of shortcut I take sometimes to get to a friend's house."

"And were you aware that Miss Roman frequented that club she was exiting from when you met her that night?"

"I never went in there myself -"

"But Mr. Adams, if you passed by that club often, you've probably seen a few regulars in the area, yes?"

"Objection!" The assistant DA jumped to her feet. "Speculation, Your Honor."

"Sustained," the judge replied. She angled a shrewd eye at the defense attorney. "Counsel, you have been warned."

"Yes, Your Honor." He cleared his throat and turned to the defense's table to consult his notes. "Mr. Adams, we have heard friends of Miss Roman's say, in this very courtroom, that Miss Roman was known to visit the nightclub in question fairly frequently. Had you seen her there before?"

"Possibly? If I did, I'm not sure I'd remember because we didn't stop and talk."

"How often would you say you pass that way?"

Dominic shrugged.

"Come on, Dominic," Jane said under her breath. "Don't get uncooperative." _Makes the jury uncertain. All the defense needs is just a seed of doubt. _She exchanged an uneasy glance with Maura.

"If you had to guess," the defense attorney pressed.

Dominic shrugged again. "Couple times a month, maybe? Not super regular."

"But you say it's possible you had seen Miss Roman at that club before."

Dominic nodded. "I think once before, yes. I think I remember seeing her."

The defense attorney paused, a hint of a smirk on his face. Those present in the courtroom began to murmur and stir again. Jane wanted to turn around and yell at them all to shut up. She must have been twitching in her seat, because Maura placed a hand on her thigh in a restraining gesture. Jane wrapped her fingers around that hand and held on tightly.

"Hopefully the jury is sensible enough to realize that observing her at the club only once prior to the night of her death is not enough to establish a habit of finding her in various places," Maura murmured.

Jane nodded, hoping against hope. This defense attorney was going to do everything in his power to cast a shadow of uncertainty on Dominic's involvement in the case.

"Only once?" the defense attorney asked.

Dominic darted a fleeting glance at Jane. She gave him the tiniest of nods. _You got this, kid._

Resolve seemed to solidify within him. He looked the lawyer in the eye, leaned into the microphone mounted on the witness stand, and said, "Yes."

"Fair enough. About how long, on the night of Miss Roman's death, would you say your conversation with her lasted?"

"Maybe a minute, tops. Just enough to say hi."

"And when the car approached the first time, she told you to hide, and you did?"

"Counsel," the judge intoned, "Mr. Adams' actions during the event have already been clearly established by the prosecution. If you have a point, I suggest you make it."

The defense attorney's expression soured slightly for a moment before he resumed his inquiries. "Do you have a cell phone, Mr. Adams?"

Dominic shook his head. "No sir."

"And why is that?"

"I can't afford one."

"What about inside the club - was there a phone in there you could have used, perhaps to call 911?"

"Probably." Dominic shrugged. "I wouldn't know, I've never been inside."

"Did it never occur to you to call the police when a violent crime was possibly taking place?"

"_That son of a bitch!_" Jane hissed under her breath.

Maura gripped her hands even more tightly.

Dominic appeared genuinely hurt by this. "I probably should've. But I didn't, 'cause I was scared. Frozen, like. I wish I'da done something, said something. And I'm sorry. So sorry." His eyes found the Roman family seated behind the prosecution. "I'm sorry."

By this time, the defense attorney was starting to get disapproving looks from members of the jury. He glanced up at the judge. "No further questions, Your Honor."

The judge nodded. "Very good. This court is adjourned for the day. We will return tomorrow at nine a.m. for closing arguments, after which the jury will be given time to deliberate and reach a verdict. Dismissed."

The gavel banged, the courtroom doors opened, and those present began to file out amidst a crescendo of murmured conversation.


End file.
